Adina Bozga - The Exasperating Gift of Singularity - Husserl, Levinas, Henry (2009, Zeta Books) (Copia en Conflicto de DESKTOP-VBQ8PFF 2018-05-20) PDF

THE EXASPERATING
GIFT OF SINGULARITY
ADINA BOZGA
THE EXASPERATING
GIFT OF SINGULARITY
HUSSERL, LEVINAS, HENRY
¤
Adina Bozga studied philosophy and political science in Bucha-
rest, Romania. She obtained her doctoral degree in philosophy in
2003 from the University of Warwick, UK. She is the author of
a series of articles in phenomenology and a member of the edito-
rial board of «Studia Phaenomenologica». Her current research in-
terests include social and political philosophy, and phenomenology.
¤
Zeta Books, Bucharest
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ISBN: 978-973-1997-04-9 (paperback)

ISBN: 978-973-1997-05-6 (ebook)
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABBREVIATIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
INTRODUCTION. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Why singularity? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
What is singularity?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Texts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Methodology. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Outline of the research. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
PART ONE:
PHENOMENOLOGY ON SINGULARITY (HUSSERL) . . . . . . . 33
I.THE PROBLEM AND ITS BACKGROUND. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

1. Reflective vs. descriptive phenomenology. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
2. The originality of being . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
3. Description vs. presumption . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
4. An ‘unfaithful’ hermeneutics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
5. Hermeneutics and singularity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
6. Defining singularity with Husserl. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
II. THE PRIMITIVE SENSE–DATA,

OR NONCOMPOUNDED SINGULARS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
1. Hyle: a problematic approach. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
2. The matter/form scheme and its limitations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
A non–intentional hyle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
An intentional hyle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
Hyletic sensibility. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
3. Hyle and life . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
Hyle: between intentionality and non–intentionality. . . . . . . . 66
Hyle and objectivity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Hyle and reflection. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
6
4. Hyle: between pure presence and temporal difference. . . . . . . . 75

An ec–static impression (M. Henry). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
Against pure presence (J. Derrida). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
5. The aporetic singularity of hyle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
Hyle: immanence, or difference? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
The singularity of hyle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
III. THE MANIFOLD–UNITARY SINGULARS,

OR SINGULARITY AS PARTICULARITY. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
1 The singularity of the transcendental. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94

a. Transcendental/empirical individuation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
Is the transcendental individuated? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
The identity of the transcendental/mundane ego. . . . . . . . . 96
Psychology and transcendental phenomenology. . . . . . . . . . 99
The phenomenological–psychological reduction . . . . . . . . 102
The transcendental eidos ego/the eidos
transcendental ego. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
b.The habitual ego. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
Towards genetic phenomenology. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
The generic ego . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
c. The passive ego. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
Primal and secondary passivity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
The anonymity of the ‘sleeping’ ego. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
2. The singularity of things. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
a. Perceptual objects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
Perceptual horizons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
Marginal and focal attention. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
b. Objects as synthetic unities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Identity–formations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Anticipation and interpretation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
The telos of a thing–in–itself. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
c. The living body . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
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The syntheses of the living body. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128

Spatial orientation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
d. The role of association in thing–constitution. . . . . . . . . . . 130
The formation of associative unities. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
Becoming otherwise. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132
Particularity vs. singularity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
IV. THE PRE–PHENOMENAL: SINGULARITY AS

UNIQUENESS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
1. The anonymous pre–ego: time–constituting

consciousness. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
An ego–less sleep. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
The three levels of temporal constitution. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
Triple intentionality. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
The ‘being–together’ and the ‘being–all–at–once’. . . . . . . . . . 141
The horizontal and the transverse intentionality. . . . . . . . . . . 143
The singularity of the flow of flows. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146
The gift of the pre–phenomenal. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
2. The world given as pre–given: the question of
pre–phenomenal spatiality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
A singular world. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
a. The world of the natural attitude . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 154
The naturalistic vs. the personalistic attitude . . . . . . . . . . . 154
The practical vs. the theoretical attitude. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
b. The progressive Cartesian epoché:
the world–‘annulment’. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160
The ‘residuum’ of the reduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160
The non–being of the world. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162
From real being to being–meant . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 164
The world–horizon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
c. Towards a regressive phenomenology:
the world given as pre–given . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168
8
Genetic constitution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168

The life–world. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
Natural attitude. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
Eidetic reduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 171
Transcendental reduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173
Passive genesis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174
d. The pre–phenomenal space . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
The pre–givenness of the world . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
The total–space . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
Singularity and the pre–phenomenal. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
PART TWO:
PHENOMENOLOGY OF SINGULARITY
(E. LEVINAS AND M. HENRY). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
V. LEVINAS ON THE SINGULARISING SINGULARITY

OF THE OTHER. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
1. Singularity beyond Husserl . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184

Singularity vs. syntheses of difference/identification. . . . . . . . 184
Phenomenology as a theory of being . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187
Factuality: beyond theory and things themselves . . . . . . . . . . 191
2. Hypostasis: the singularity of the here . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
Escaping existence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193
The hypostatic existent. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195
The decline of hypostasis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199
Singularity: Being/beings without ‘nomos’. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
3. Breaching totality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 205
Totality and the other. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206
The idea of infinity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
A naked phenomenology. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208
Creatio ex nihilo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211
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‘Describing’ the other. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213

An economical singularity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214
Separation and welcoming: multiple singularities. . . . . . . . . . 217
4. The trace of the pre–original . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
The origin and the pre–original. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219
Anarchic subjectivity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221
Diachrony and the trace. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 224
‘Saying’ the phenomenological reduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 226
Assemblage and language. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
An otherwise than temporality. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 228
A barbarous ‘logos’. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 230
The said of the pre–original. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232
The ambiguity of Levinas’s saying. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234
Substituting singulars: ethics and election . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236
VI. MICHEL HENRY ON THE SINGULAR

IPSEITY OF LIFE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
1. Against Husserl: towards absolute singularity. . . . . . . . . . . . . 241

The radical reduction of the visible. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
Husserl’s misconception of singularity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 245
Why is life singular?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250
2. The non–contextual singularity of life . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253
a. On indifference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253
With Levinas: going beyond identity and difference. . . . . . 253
Merleau–Ponty: the non–dualism of the visible and the
invisible. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 256
A ‘good’ dialectic. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
A ‘chiasmatic’ invisible. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259
The monist reversibility of the chiasm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 262
Surpassing difference through indifference. . . . . . . . . . . . . 265
b. Ec–stases of the invisible . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 268
A ‘phenomenology’ of the invisible . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 268
10
A barbarous invisible. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 271

The transcendent ego, or the son of the world. . . . . . . . . . 273
Henry’s monism. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 275
3. The non–synthetic life. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 276
The community with the other life. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277
Individuation vs. individuality. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
The inner temporality of life. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 282
The immemorial memory of the ‘I can’:
original resistance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283
The ipseity of a singular self/Self. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285
Life and life: is man not God himself?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 286
Birth vs. creation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 288
Multiple singularities. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289
4. The giving of a singular life . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293
Singularity: the gift of life . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293
Deceitful gifts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 294
The gift: possession and dispossession . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 296
The ethical ‘counter–gift’. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 298
The giving: with, or without its giver. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
Phenomenology and Christianity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303
CONCLUSION. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304
The progress of the study. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304
Results. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 309
Further considerations: between a singular in itself
and a singular givenness. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313
BIBLIOGRAPHY. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 325
ABBREVIATIONS
The following list offers abbreviations of the works that are discussed in this
book. When reference is made to these texts, the first page number refers to
the English translation, the second to the German or French edition.
Works by Edmund Husserl

Amsterdam Lectures – [App. Hua IX] in Psychological and Transcendental
Phenomenology and the Confrontation with Heidegger 1927–1931, trans.
T. Sheehan & R. E. Palmer, Dordrecht, Kluwer Academic Publishers,
1997, pp. 197–254.
APAS – Analyses Concerning Passive and Active Synthesis: Lectures on
Transcendental Logic [Hua XI], trans. A. J. Steinbock, Dordrecht, Kluwer
Academic Publishers, 2001.
CM – Cartesian Meditations [Hua I], trans. D. Cairns, The Hague,
Martinus Nijhoff, 1973.
C – The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology [Hua
VI], trans. D. Carr, Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 1970.
DR – Thing and Space [Hua XVI], trans. R. Rojcewicz, Dordrecht, Kluwer
EJ – Experience and Judgement, trans. J. S. Churchill & K. Ameriks,
Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 1973.
Idea – Husserl, E., The Idea of Phenomenology [Hua II], trans. L. Hardy,
Dordrecht, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1999.
Id I – Ideas Pertaining to a Pure Phenomenology and to a Phenomenological
Philosophy. First Book: General Introduction to a Pure Phenomenology [Hua
III], trans. F. Kersten, Dordrecht, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1998).
Id II – Ideas Pertaining to a Pure Phenomenology and to a Phenomenological
Philosophy. Second Book: Studies in the Phenomenology of Constitution [Hua
IV], trans. R. Rojcewicz & A. Schuwer, Dordrecht, Kluwer Academic
Publishers, 1989.
12
La Terre ne se meut pas – La Terre ne se meut pas [Manuscripts D17,

D18 & D12 IV], trans. D. Franck, D. Pradelle & J. F. Lavigne, Paris,
Editions de Minuit, 1989.
LI I/II – Logical Investigations 2 vols. trans. J. N. Findlay, New York,
Humanities Press, 1970.
OdG – L’origine de la géométrie traduction et introduction par Jacques
Derrida, Paris, PUF, 1974.
PCIT – On the Phenomenology of the Consciousness of Internal Time [Hua
X], trans. J. B. Brough, Dordrecht, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1991.
PP – Phenomenological Psychology [Hua IX], trans. J. Scanlon, The Hague,
Martinus Nijhoff, 1977.
Works by Emmanuel Levinas

DE – De l’évasion, Montpellier, Fata Morgana, 1982.
DEH – Discovering Existence with Husserl, trans. R. A. Cohen and M. B.
Smith, Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 1998.
DMT – Dieu, la mort et le temps, Paris, Editions Grasset & Fasquelle,
1993.
DQVI – De Dieu qui vient à l’idée, Paris, Librairie Philosophique J. Vrin,
1982.
EE – Existence and Existents trans. A. Lingis, The Hague, Nijhoff, 1978;
[DEE] De l’existence à l’existant, Paris, Librairie Philosophique J. Vrin,
1978).
EI – Ethique et Infini (Dialogue avec Philippe Nemo), Paris, Librairie
Artème Fayard et Radio France, 1982.
HH – Humanisme de l’autre homme, Montpellier, Fata Morgana, 1972.
OBBE – Otherwise than Being or Beyond Essence, trans. A.Lingis, The
Hague, Nijhoff, 1981; [AEAE] (Autrement qu’être ou au–delà de l’essence,
The Hague, Nijhoff, 1978).
13
ITN – In the Time of the Nations, trans. M.Smith, London, The Athlone
Press, 1994.
TA – Le temps et l’autre, Montpellier, Paris, Fata Morgana, Quadrige –
PUF, 1983.
TI – Totality and Infinity: An Essay on Exteriority, trans. A. Lingis, The
Hague, Nijhoff, 1991; [TeI] (Totalité et infini: essai sur l’extériorité, The
Hague, Nijhoff, 1980).
TIH – The Theory of Intuition in Husserl’s Phenomenology, trans. A. Orianne,
Evanston, Northwestern University Press, 1973; [TIHP] (La théorie de
l’intuition dans la phénoménologie de Husserl, Paris, Alcan, 1930).
Works by Michel Henry

B – La Barbarie, Paris, Bernard Grasset, 1987.
CV – C’est moi la verité. Pour une philosophie du christianisme, Paris,
Seuil, 1996.
EM – The Essence of Manifestation, trans. G. Etzkorn, The Hague,
Nijhoff, 1973.
GP – The Genealogy of Psychoanalysis, trans. D. Brick, California,
Stanford University Press, 1993.
I – Incarnation. Une philosophie de la chair, Paris, Seuil, 2000.
PM – Phénoménologie matérielle, Paris, PUF, 1990.
PPC – Philosophie et phénoménologie du corps, Paris, PUF, 1997
Works by Jacque Derrida

GT – Given Time: I Counterfeit Money, trans. P. Kamuf, Chicago &
London, University of chicago Press, 1992
MP – Marges de la philosophie, Paris, Minuit, 1972
OG – Edmund Husserl’s “The Origin of Geometry”: an Introduction, New
York, Nicholas Hays Ltd., 1978.
14
SP – ‘Speech and Phenomena’, in Speech and Phenomena and Other Essays

on Husserl’s Theory of Signs, Evanston, Northwestern University Press,
1973, pp. 3–107.
Works by Gilles Deleuze

DR – Difference and Repetition, trans. P. Patton, London, Continuum,
2001
Works by Jean–Luc Marion

GB – God without Being, trans. Th. Carlson, Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1991.
INTRODUCTION
Why singularity?
In our conceptual history, terms recede in importance or acquire
new significance, fade away or re-emerge. Every philosophical epoch
or conceptual movement is consolidated around key-terms that guide
discussions and form almost axiomatic bases. Be it being, difference,
reason, imagination, nature, God or technology – we can character-
ise a philosophical frame of thought by means of a few concepts. This
is the case with the notion of singularity, which gains more and more
weight within our current debates, in particular through the work
of thinkers like G. Deleuze, but also, as this book demonstrates , by
means of contemporary writings in phenomenology.
One can say that our interest in difference, in an age that
Lyotard has diagnosed as that of the death of grand narratives, is
responsible for the significance of the singular. The universal ex-
planatory systems, which have preceded the explosion of generali-
sations, have sustained a particular type of communality that our
minoritarian concerns, with their separating tendencies and dis-
tanciation from the norm, cannot sanction anymore. The rejection
of centred discourses constitutes the basis of singularity. Yet, the
concern for primitive relativism, which is the origin of the singular,
while bringing forth the recognition of diversity, also presupposes
a communal ground, which accompanies the search for difference.
Indeed, separation always discovers deeper levels of communality
and intersection, and its regressive movement towards a more re-
strictive specificity seems to be supported by a layer of general char-
acteristics. Singularity, though, takes to its extreme the interest in
diversity, crossing the communal line that unites individuals within
their particular regionalisms. Thus, the tendency to fragment gen-
eral formations into more primitive elements of diversification ini-
tiates, at its extreme, a discourse about singularity.
16 INTRODUCTION
From this perspective, we can say that singularity undercuts, in

a paradoxical manner, that which it attempts to achieve: a veritable
interest in the different, in the one which is alien to my value sys-
tem, in the relative. That is, indeed, the most radical fascination that
motivates the dispute against the system and the totality it institutes.
The singular is precisely that which refuses any commonality. It is the
most non-relativist basis which no syntheses can ecompass. The de-
centring effort appears to produce the precise image that it is fighting
against: a new solidified norm, which is embodied in the attractive-
ness of the radically different or the absolute other. Through a radical
diairesis, against every sunagôgê: the different claims the rights to its
separation, by excluding the general rule and the dominating uni-
fication under communal categories. Thus, the centre returns: the
singular takes the form of auto-donation in spite of its proclaimed
death. Unveiling the need for breaching the system, and the neutral
community that brings everything to the tautology of an ultimate
explanation, the different renders possible a strange enchantment:
the one with the unique, or the singular. For the one that believed
that the tyranny of the systems was engendering the concern for mi-
norities, the discourse that claims legitimacy in favour of the exotic is
bad news. The centre shifts sides and becomes ultimate and extreme:
the intransigence risks to be even more acute. Under these circum-
stances, should we not ask ourselves what the nature of this concern
for absolute difference is? Or how is the relapse into the radical im-
manence of the subject possible? Moreover, how do these two appar-
ently contrasting concerns form a new commonality? And how do
they justify their accounts?
We have already determined that an interest in the singular
can be explained as an extension of and an overemphasis on the
different. However, there is another equally important aspect to
this tendency. Within an over-fluid context of reference, we look
for unchanging certainties, for points of anchorage that cannot be
INTRODUCTION 17
open to relativism, but sustain our needs for an immobile ground.

Moments of maximal dispersion call for a counter-reactive factor,
which reorganises regionalisms into universal points of intersec-
tions and into invariable features. These two tendencies are always
present in our lives, at a functional level, as well as at a discursive
one. Dividing and re-compounding…The singular plays, thus,
the role of bringing together these two extremes through ultimate
specification and radical universality. In fact, there is no contradic-
tion in defining singularity as a universal element, and that is the
main reason for the proximity that can be established between ab-
solute difference and complete self-coincidence.
Dualistic structures have been contested in recent philosophy,
as well as the synthetic reconciliation of contrasts. The difference
imposed by dualism is still too communal to produce a veritable
abandonment of generalised systems of explanation. In response, a
philosophy of the One, which eludes both difference and identity
while coinciding with an extreme form of the two, calls for atten-
tion. A philosophy of the singular is open to suspicions related to a
return to purist arguments: black and white are cognate as far as grey
is concerned. That is why a constitutive approach may throw light as
to the sources of this search for absolute data. If we are to reject the
axiomatic dimension of the singular, a descriptive investigation into
the formation of this notion becomes necessary. Thus, new ques-
tions arise: is the singular real? Does it, on the contrary, belong to
the constructive performance of our own ‘minds’? Yet, if we simply
accept the reality of the singular, the justification is either absent,
or it duplicates, through its explanatory notion, the singularity that
it is supposed to defend. Concepts and reality have to coincide, so
that discourse does not endanger the privilege of the singular. But a
further distinction might need to be introduced here between a sin-
gular experience and the experience of singularity… A study of the
singular will have to offer a careful consideration of the two.
18 INTRODUCTION
In light of these distinctions, the singular, if it is to be accepted

as a legitimate demand within a descriptive discourse, will have to
be scrutinised by means of a phenomenological research. Two of the
voices that have philosophically imposed a reconsideration of the
possibility of the singular claim to have inherited the principles of
the phenomenological tradition. In this sense, a phenomenology of
singularity, apart from offering an insight that is descriptive, con-
stitutive and reductive, has a strong textual basis that permits us to
work with ‘communal’ intuitions.
What is singularity?
The Latin semantic area of the term ‘singularity’ is remarkable

as to its complexity. While we can find a Greek line of analogy
in the terms monas (unit, individual), atomos (indivisible unit), or
in the neo-platonic notion of to hen (the One from which every-
thing derives), the Latin denotative field of ‘singularity’ attests to
its broad richness. Starting with singularis, e (one by one, one at
a time, alone, single, solitary; alone of its kind, unique, match-
less, unparalleled, extraordinary, remarkable)1 and continuing with
singulariter (singly, separately), singularitas, atis (a being alone or
single, singleness), singularius, a, um (single, separate, alone of its
kind), and singuli, ae, a (separate, single), the notion of ‘singularity’
plays a significant role, especially in medieval philosophies, in de-
fining God’s essence, individuality, or ‘maxime universalia’. Along
with its synonyms (unicus, unus, praestans, etc.), singularity is at
times opposed to pluralitas, or diversitas. Additionally, singularis
can also mean ‘belonging to a particular person or thing, specific,
1 Latin Dictionary (C.T. Lewis & C. Short eds., Oxford, Clarendon Press,
1879).
INTRODUCTION 19
peculiar, individual’2 and, in this situation, ‘singularity’ is related to

‘particularity’. Based on these distinctions, we can divide the con-
notations of the term ‘singularity’ into several distinctive classes.
Firstly, singularity can be regarded as the characteristic of being
alone of its kind (God). Secondly, the singular can define the ulti-
mate genus, which, though belonging to the class of genera, is yet
unique3. Thirdly, singularity appears as connected to matter (prin-
cipium singularitatis est materia) and is, usually, extended to mean
particularity, i.e. a specific aggregation of primitive elements.
In our study, singularity will be given a definition in conformity
with Husserl’s distinction between parts and wholes, designating,
in its initial stage, non-synthetic elements, ultimate wholes, and
manifold-unitary individualities. As we advance with our investiga-
tions, a more restrictive denotation will be suggested. The meaning
of singularity as particularity will be considered as merely derivative
and rooted in the ultimate levels of primitive data. Accordingly, the
singular will be defined as non-synthetic, in the sense of not being
open to division into parts and, also, to more encompassing syn-
theses. This evolution in the applicability of the term parallels the
internal movement of ideas in the phenomenological exploration
of singularity. Thus, the singular comes to signify the one that does
not enter a relation of communality with anything else4, not even
with itself if its self-coincidence is historical.
2 Oxford Latin Dictionary (P. G. W. Glare ed., Oxford, Clarendon Press,
1976).
3 Cf. ‘universalitas absoluta cum absoluta singularitate coincidit’, N. de Cues,
Apologia doctae ignorantiae (quoted by J.-F. Marquet, Singularité et événe-
ment, Grenoble, Millon, 1995).
4 ‘the singular [is] that which has absolutely nothing communal or generic,
from which every characteristic of universality is excluded’, (J.-F. Marquet,
op. cit., p. 214).
20 INTRODUCTION
In demarcating the denotative area of ‘singularity’, it is impor-

tant to make clear at once what is excluded from this term. The
singular cannot be confused with the event insofar as the temporal
association evoked by the latter is inadequate for the description
of singularity. The main reason is to be found in the transfer of
focus, operated within a phenomenology of singularity, from the
temporal order of the originated, to the pre-original. At the same
time, the singular cannot be assimilated to difference, even when it
is conceived, as Derrida and Deleuze do in their writings, as non-
dialectic. The justification for opting for the term ‘singularity’ is
double: firstly, it is adequate for a non-dyadic and almost monist
type of discourse; secondly, the authors that are studied in this book
employ themselves the term ‘singularity’ in the course of their phe-
nomenological explorations. Thus, despite a ‘family resemblance’,
the notion of singularity appears to be more appropriate to the
phenomenological search that we will set forth. Nevertheless, this
characterisation is not meant as a rigid definition, but merely as
an attempt to stake out the area of this research, leaving open the
possibility of further distinctions and parallelisms in the course of
these investigations.
Authors
Thinking the singular seems to have always been the kernel of a
philosophical inquiry that attempts to seize its origin (Ur) and oper-
ates with criteria of evaluation of its own efforts in terms of original
adequacy (be it between rei and intellectus, God and human com-
prehension, etc). Indeed, one can say, with J. -F. Marquet that ‘the
origin of every philosophy is in the experience of the Unique, that
is to say, of that which, as pure singularity, excludes every “specific-
INTRODUCTION 21
ity” or “generality” and tolerates, at the end, only a proper name’5.

In phenomenology, singularity is articulated in accordance with the
restrictions imposed by the turn towards phenomena. Following a
reductive move, the existent is confined to a realm of givenness that
involves a constituting activity from the actor of the suspension. The
singular appears, thus, in relation to the original foundation of the
epoché and, also, under the teleological motivation for full given-
ness. Despite a broad spectrum of phenomenological studies, this
book will not offer an exhaustive presentation of all the potential
connections to a phenomenology of the singular. A special effort has
been made to incorporate a limited number of illustrative texts into
this study to allow for a more in-depth analysis of the theme of sin-
gularity. Thus, the first part of this book will be devoted to discuss-
ing Husserl’s inaugural writings due mainly to the complexity of the
conceptual apparatus that they offer and the incisive scope of their
investigations. The main definition that we will employ throughout
5 J.-F. Marquet, op. cit., p. 51. It is interesting to follow, in Marquet’s book,
a justification of this idea in the trajectory that singularity has throughout
the history of philosophy. Starting with questions about the One, in An-
tiquity, passing through a Christian type of inquiry rooted in the model of
the Only, Marquet traces the installation of the Singular at the centre of
modern philosophies. Defined as absolute determination, singularity is the
attribute of the divine. However, with Descartes, there are two singulars
that are brought to light: God and the ego. The theme is recurrent and ex-
emplified in relation to the philosophies of Spinoza, Leibniz, Kant, Hegel,
Kierkegaard and Nietzsche. Thus, the operative scheme of the singular is
captured by Marquet in the following note: ‘a particular subject, proceed-
ing, through suspension, towards the universal, to a redeeming discovery
of a recapitulative singularity’ (p. 40). Furthermore, the singular is to be
rediscovered in the post-kantian Einzelne, in Bergson’s durée, and even in
Husserl’s transcendental ego. Significantly, the centrality of this concept in
Deleuze’s work also implies a line of continuity with regard to thinkers like
Ockham, Leibniz, Bergson, etc.
22 INTRODUCTION
our examination has its origin in Husserl’s work. In this sense, the
functional framework of our exploratory search will be established in
connection to it. On the basis of these analyses, the second part of
this book discusses two endeavours to construct a phenomenology
of the singular. E. Levina’s explicit efforts to characterise the other
as singular, together with M. Henry’s search for an absolute imma-
nence, will be taken as textual grounds for unveiling the prominent
issues concerning a phenomenology of the singular.
Before we touch on the problem of an interpretative approach
to these texts, let us mention that at least two other phenomenolog-
ical accounts of singularity can be suggested. Indeed, Heidegger’s
emphasis on Being as primordial, One, and absolute beginning
seems to correspond to our delineation of the singular. According
to Heidegger, the forgetfulness of Being in traditional metaphysics
requires that the question regarding its meaning be raised anew
so that a return to the origin can be achieved. Moving from the
question concerning beings to the one of Being, man retrieves the
original. But Being continually withdraws from every revealing ef-
fort, restoring its primacy in this concealment that accompanies
the process of its revelation. Opposed to the multiple nature of be-
ings, Being is unique, singular. Being is also simple and indestruc-
tible, addressing a voiceless appeal to beings. To conform to the
demand of givenness, man, of all beings, is the locus where Being
shows itself, and is singularised through this task. As we shall see,
there are several motifs in Heidegger’s thought that are recurrent in
a phenomenology of the singular. The idea of a veiled revelation,
of the language as the Saying of Being, the theme of the original -
they all point to a specific phenomenological investigation that is
related to the singular. However, though acknowledging potential
parallelisms, Heidegger’s phenomenology will not be thoroughly
discussed, but merely invoked as to sustain the line of argumenta-
tion of this research.
INTRODUCTION 23
Merleau-Ponty’s work will be given some consideration in rela-

tion to a phenomenology of the invisible. The possibility of ap-
proaching singularity through the notion of chiasm will also be
mentioned. Nevertheless, as it is the case with other phenomeno-
logical investigations, it is beyond the scope of this research to offer
a complete historical survey of all these original contributions. In
turn, Levinas’s philosophy of the responsibility for the other, and
Henry’s exploration of the self-affection of life as absolute imma-
nence will be given a special attention. The reasons behind this
decision are multiple:
• both accounts are more explicit in their analyses of the
singular
• they continue and radicalise the line of a phenomenological
enterprise, but, in contrast to other phenomenological
incursions, they take a monist stand, which, as we shall
discover, is demanded by a concern with the singular6
• they return to and integrate previous results within
the phenomenological tradition, allowing for broader
terminological exchanges.
• they offer a phenomenological insight into the process
through which singularity singularises the one that is at
the centre of the reduction, revealing a more complex
multiplication of singularities. In this sense, they not only
6 In ‘L’Appel et le Phénomène’, F. Laruelle (Revue de metaphysique et de mo-
rale, 96/1, 1991, pp. 27-41) calls Levinas and Henry thinkers of ‘the One
or the Simple’ (p. 34). However, within Laruelle’s own thinking, ‘Un-en-
Un’ is not henological, but encompasses duality whilst rejecting a synthetic
dualism (Cf. Principes de la non-philosophie, Paris, PUF, 1996). For a de-
tailed account of ‘la pensée sans mixte’ of Levinas, Henry and Laruelle, Cf.
H. Choplin, De la phénoménologie à la non-philosophie. Lévinas et Laruelle,
Paris, Kimé, 1997.
24 INTRODUCTION
emphasise singularity as primal philosophical concern,

but also develop an insightful conception of the process
of multiplication of the singular.
• they appear as contrastive and, hence, reduce each other as to
the level of presuppositions embodied in a phenomenology
of singularity. This specific aspect facilitates the task of
subtracting only the fundamental intuitions regarding a
phenomenological treatment of the singular.
• they illustrate the double tendency we have evoked in the
first section: the one towards absolute difference and, also,
the one towards maximal self-coincidence.
Texts
While secondary literature is abundant and almost difficult to
control as far as Husserl’s writings are concerned, I have not yet
come across a research that looks at the issue of singularity in rela-
tion to his work. With regard to Levinas’s writings, the question of
singularity, if acknowledged at all7, is restricted to the description of
the self within the enjoyment of economical life, and through the
ethical stages of the reduction. Following a specific and still largely
unexamined line of argumentation, my study is not meant to offer
a panoramic survey of all the issues that have already been or can be
investigated concerning Levinas’s work8. Furthermore, the presen-
7 The most detailed study on this topic is R. Visker’s Truth and Singularity
(Taking Foucault into Phenomenology), Dordrecht, Kluwer, 1999.
8 For a grasp of the wide variety of themes that have been explored in rela-
tion to Levinas’s texts, see the following collections of essays, which con-
tain valuable contributions from a broad range of Levinasian scholars: Re-
reading Levinas (R. Bernasconi & S. Critchley eds., Bloomington, Indiana
University Press, 1991); Face to Face with Levinas (R. A. Cohen ed., New
York, State University, 1986); Positivité et Transcendance (J.-L. Marion ed,
INTRODUCTION 25
tation and interpretation of Henry’s phenomenology offered by this

study does not pretend to be the only possible exposition finding
justification in his texts. In fact, Henry’s philosophy has provoked,
among its readers, two distinctive interpretative positions9. That
is, a ‘minimalist’ one, which accords pre-eminence to the absolute-
ness of self-affection; and a ‘maximalist’ one, which considers that
immanence and transcendence, far from being exclusive of each
other, can be defined only in terms of an original co-belonging10.
While I acknowledge the operative aspect of the second position
with regard to the inextricable problems that a radical interpreta-
tion cannot solve (i.e. the being of the world, the relation with the
other, temporality), I take in this book a minimalist approach and
support my claims with strong textual evidence. In this respect,
the idea of ‘transcendence within immanence’, whilst having an
Paris, PUF, 2000); Textes pour Émmanuel Lévinas (F. Laruelle ed., Paris,
Jean-Michel Place, 1980), The Provocation of Levinas (R. Bernasconi &
D. Wood eds., London, Routledge, 1988), The Face of the Other and the
Trace of God (J. Bloechl ed., New York, Fordham University Press, 2000).
Apart from interpretations that focus on Levinas’s work in dialogue with
the philosophies of Plato, Kant, Sarte, Husserl, Buber, Derrida, etc., there
are ample studies in the secondary literature that stress specific issues (e.g.
feminism, politics, psychotherapy, religion, bio-ethics, etc.). For further
references, see bibliography.
9 E.g. F. Khosrokhavar, ‘La duplicité du paraître. Sur la double lecture de
Michel Henry’, Revue philosophique de la France et de l’Étranger, 126/3,
2001, pp. 321-338.
10 Especially Y. Yamagata (‘Une autre lecture de l’Essence de la manifestation:
immanence, présent vivant et altérité’, Les Études philosophiques, 2, 1991, pp.
173-191); S. Laoureux (‘De l’auto-affection à l’auto-affection. Remarques
sur l’experience d’autrui dans la phénoménologie de Michel Henry’, Alter,
7, 1991, pp. 149-168); J.-M. Longneaux (‘D’une philosophie de la transcen-
dance à une philosophie de l’immanence’, Revue philosophique de la France
et de l’Étranger, 126/3, 2001, pp. 305-319).
26 INTRODUCTION
undoubting heuristic value, situates Henry’s writings in a replicat-

ing tradition with regard to Husserl’s ideas. Thus, I consider that
a more tolerant approach to the question of immanence obscures
the originality of a phenomenology of absolute subjectivity, to the
point of transforming it in a more recent version of Husserl’s own
thought. Obviously, Henry departs from Husserl’s phenomenol-
ogy and it is in the interval thus created that this book is situated.
Furthermore, as other ‘minimalists’11 have already illustrated, as-
senting to such an interpretation, one feels obliged to undertake
a strong criticism towards its extreme form of phenomenology. As
it is the case with the other authors discussed in this book, an ex-
ploration of the insights of a phenomenology of singularity is my
primary objective. In this sense, critical aspects will be deepened
only when they are centrally connected to my account.
Methodology
Debating the problem of methodology in relation to phenom-
enology can comprise different approaches. Indeed, one can view
phenomenology as a field of problems and apply to these desig-
nated questions a method of inquiry. It is this particular aspect that
delimits phenomenology as a method for understanding directly
our experiential processes. However, a second connotation can be
given to methodological tools in phenomenology, which points to
a type of access to primal phenomena through texts. In this sec-
11 E.g. M. Haar (‘Michel Henry entre phénoménologie et métaphysique’,
Philosophie, 15, 1987, pp.30-54); J.-L. Chrétien (‘La vie sauve’, Les Études
philosophiques, 1, 1988, pp. 37-49); D. Zahavi, Self-awareness and Alter-
ity. A Phenomenological Investigation (Evaston, Northwestern University
Press, 1999); J.L. Marion (‘Générosité et phénoménologie. Remarques sur
l’interprétation du cogito cartésien’, Les Études philosophiques, 1, 1988, pp.
51-72).
INTRODUCTION 27
ond definition, the method functions at a meta-phenomenal level

and suggests that a ‘training’ of our intuitive grasp can be realised
through formative texts. In this case, inaugural writings open up
problems and inform their readers about how to direct their re-
search towards things themselves. Nevertheless, there is a third de-
notative dimension that we want to stress in relation to the question
of methodology, which involves secondary textual elaboration. The
point that we want to make is that a meta-meta-discourse in phe-
nomenology can still be phenomenological. Operating a reduction
of the canonical tendency, which confines the research within the
boundaries set by primary texts, meta-phenomenology provokes
violence within the first level of textual production. If it does not
relapse into sterile reproduction or deviant dogmatism, this inter-
pretative strategy has the merit of stimulating a first-hand descrip-
tion of phenomena. As Merleau-Ponty declares about Husserl’s
philosophy, ‘interpretation is restricted to either inevitable distor-
tions or literal production’12. In the former situation, the gain can
be a return to the basic motif that has incited the first thematic
approach to phenomena. It is in light of this movement that this
research is conducted. Far from embarking on a purely historical
enterprise, this study will question and suspend the claims of ca-
nonical texts by means of secondary interpretations. A reading of
Husserl’s oeuvre, articulated through the search for singularity, will
disclose the complex argumentative apparatus at work in the pri-
mary texts. Delimiting lines of investigations, I shall then appeal
to the work of those that have attempted a more radical reduction,
and an interruption of dogmatic loyalty. Likewise, our hermeneu-
tic situation pertains to a phenomenological examination insofar as
continuity is to be achieved through cross-investigation and meta-
12 M. Merleau-Ponty, Signes (Evanston, Northwestern University Press,
1964), p. 159.
28 INTRODUCTION
reductive interpretations. As Husserl himself says, ‘the form of phe-

nomenological investigation is a zigzag (…). One starts out, goes a
certain distance, then goes back at the beginning, and what one has
learned one applies to the beginning’13. In more specific terms, the
central assumption as regards methodological issues in this research
is that, in analysing phenomenology at work, one also gets involved
in a direct questioning of phenomena.
Outline of the research

This book is divided into two main parts and comprises a dis-
cussion of phenomenology on singularity and of phenomenology
of singularity. This distinction echoes the internal configuration of
the argument: while the first part offers a conceptual and problem-
atic apparatus required for a project on the singular, it is only in the
second part that phenomenology defines itself as fundamentally
oriented towards an understanding of singularity. Thus, the divi-
sion of the present research corresponds to an evolution in phe-
nomenology’s emphasis on the singular. The first part, which is
an investigation of Husserl’s potential contribution to a phenom-
enological approach to singularity, drafts the issues that are to be
addressed in the second part. Additionally, it is against Husserl’s
complex conceptual background that a positive definition of the
singular will be established. In more precise terms, the first part
proposes three directions that are to be explored.
Firstly, the singular is characterised as the one that comprises a
maximal degree of specification. Indeed, in the denotative sphere
of singularity, one can find the idea of an absolute simplicity, which
cannot be fragmented into further parts. With this intuition, we
13 D. Cairns, Conversations with Husserl and Fink (The Hague, Martinus Ni-
jhoff, 1976), p. 27.
INTRODUCTION 29
turn, in the first chapter, to an analysis of hyle in Husserl’s phe-

nomenology. The sensuous data are considered to play the role
of primitive elements, similar to the atomic entities that absolute
specificity presupposes. In the course of our examination, an ad-
ditional problem occurs: these ultimate data are temporal, either
in the sense of being repetitive, or as pure presence, instantaneous
moments. Both alternatives will be considered in great detail, by
means of a dialogue with two critical appropriations of Husserl’s
texts on hyletic data: J. Derrida and M. Henry.
The second chapter attempts to define singularity starting with
its common identification with particularity. In this perspective,
singularity is delimited not as a simple and non-compounded da-
tum, but as a unique cluster of characteristics. In this light, two
presentations are suggested: on the transcendental side, we study
the issue of individuation and its connection to the mundane ego;
as far as transcendence is concerned, we focus on the structure of
things as manifold-unities. We shall demonstrate that a generic
constitution alters the originality of the singular taken as particu-
larity, and obliges us to return to the primitive strata of sensuous
data. A third direction is, then, proposed: the singular, since it is
non-synthetic, will be identified to maximal inclusiveness. The
third chapter sets out to argue that time-consciousness and the
total space are not simple assemblages and do not involve multi-
plication. The compounded configuration of particular unities is,
hence, surpassed by an inquiry into the ultimate and non-synthetic
forms that are involved in all constitutive acts. This scrutiny will
reveal that pre-phenomenal aspects are intertwined with phenom-
enological data, and that the singular which escapes generic refer-
ences fails to attain givenness.
In the second part of the study we shall present the passage
towards a phenomenology of singularity, which points to two so-
30 INTRODUCTION
lutions. Firstly, Levinas’s phenomenological grasp of the singular

will be posited, inscribing a reworking of Husserl’s form of inves-
tigation and questioning the commitment to being presupposed
by phenomenology. In his attempt to formulate an alternative to
Husserl’s analyses, Levinas discovers that being is itself sheer ano-
nymity and resembles the neutral stance of previous phenomeno-
logical examinations. As a result, Levinas traces the formation of a
singular self, which responds to the tautological nature of existence.
However, this singularity is itself open to repetitive and self-asser-
tive characteristics, degenerating into a suffocating identity. That
is why the solution of the hypostatic singular is provisional, at-
testing though to the constant preoccupation that guides Levinas’s
philosophy. In the final sections of the fourth chapter a presenta-
tion of the singularising singularity of the other is effected. In his
search for separation, Levinas finds in the phenomenology of the
other a final and resolute answer. The remarkable multiplication of
singulars will provide an extra dimension to the phenomenological
register of singularity.
The second solution reverses the themes presented in Levinas’s
texts: instead of a radical form of separation, M. Henry’s writings
will introduce the singularity of self-affection. Across an examina-
tion of life and pure immanence, Henry builds a critical appraisal
of Husserl’s concept of singularity. In continuity with previous
phenomenological preoccupations, Henry’s phenomenology of
life expands into two directions. Firstly, attacking the synthetic
unification of immanence into further wholes, Henry criticises all
dualistic elements. Merleau-Ponty’s revision of dialectics provides
the background against which Henry’s monist conception of life as
invisibility is posited. Furthermore, ec-stases of immanence are de-
limited as to explain why singularity cannot tolerate other centres.
The immanent singular is, then, revealed as the most integrative
principle that no synthesis can encompass. Secondly, life cannot
INTRODUCTION 31
be singular if it comprises an inner partition. Thirdly, immanence

has an internal tension that does not generate fragmentation into
parts. Moreover, it is significant that the multiplication of singu-
lars, found in Levinas’s phenomenology, reoccurs in the course of
our examination of Henry’s phenomenological emphasis on life. In
the final section of the chapter on Henry, an explanatory distinc-
tion between a phenomenology of singularity and phenomenology
on singularity is introduced. The matrix of our interpretation is
based on the distinction between the giving and the gift, which we
draw out of Marion’s philosophy.
The conclusive part of the book recapitulates the main steps of
the argument and the characteristics of a phenomenology of singu-
larity. It also rises questions regarding the hypothesis of an existing
singular and the possibility of a singular datum, capturing the clues
that texts on singularity make available. The closing remarks indicate
that an interest in singularity breaks with a restrictive and purist form
of phenomenology, inviting for a more tolerant focus on explanatory
hints rather than ultimate explanations. It also suggests that, based
on communal intuitions, an indirect phenomenology, built in reso-
nance with issues related to intersubjectivity, can be adopted in our
interpretation of writings in a phenomenology of singularity.
PART ONE
PHENOMENOLOGY ON SINGULARITY
(HUSSERL)
‘The singular, the real singular is not an unity that can be
counted or compared; it is neither an interchangeable unity,
as we can exchange the place of objects in space; because it is
absolutely original, it is not preceded by any “ground” or by
any homogeneous and uniform horizon’ (F.-D. Sebbah)1.
‘Later Husserl complained of the objectional etymological

meaning of individual, objectional when one uses the term
to mean das Einmalige (the one-time affair, never repeatable)’
(D. Cairns)2.
CHAPTER I
THE PROBLEM AND ITS BACKGROUND
Reflective vs. descriptive phenomenology

The starting point of Husserl’s idea of phenomenology is the
search for an absolute basis for philosophical investigations, which
no one can doubt and which is to form the ground of a rigorous
science. In this respect, phenomenology is to achieve, by means of a
critical and systematic insight, transparent knowledge and universal
validity. Husserl’s appeal ‘Züruck zu den Sachen Selbst!’ is illustrative
1 ‘Éveil et naissance. Quelques remarques à partir d’Emmanuel Lévinas et
Michel Henry’ (Alter, 1, 1993, pp. 213-239), p. 235, note 1.
2 D. Cairns, op. cit., p. 34.
34 PHENOMENOLOGY ON SINGULARITY
to this point, as it invokes the need for an immediate grasp of the

objective. However, the phenomenological program is caught into a
permanent tension that mirrors the oscillation between faithfulness
to the original experience of the objective, and the reflective nature
of its approach. Indeed, how are we to account for both the exigency
of an intuitive, immediate and concrete experience, and the repre-
sentational aspect of the reduction, which neutralises modes of being
in favour of modes of being meant? In the critical approach to the na-
iveté of the natural attitude, in which things are taken to exist in an
unquestioned manner, phenomenology discovers the ultimate foun-
dation for absolute cognition: transcendental subjectivity. In light
of this discovery, objectivity is constituted by absolute conscious-
ness in a reflective turn that aspires at being merely descriptive. To
quote Heidegger, phenomenology is a ‘battle cry against free-floating
thought’3, which means that the phenomenological examination of
the matters themselves aspires to become a ‘demonstrative work’4.
But how do we bring together the original experiencing of the tran-
scendent and the delay presupposed by the access to the things them-
selves? How can we grasp reflectively, through the epoché, the factual
experience, which conditions and precedes every representational ex-
perience? Can a reflection ever be descriptive and do justice to the
pre-reflective immediacy of original experience?
As Husserl states, ‘the phenomenological method operates ex-
clusively in acts of reflection’5. In other words, phenomenology is
by definition reflective, constituting the intuiting, immediate experi-
ence of things après coup, on the basis of a recollective consciousness.
The reflective regard of consciousness cannot engage in present in-
tentional givenness, but develops exclusively as a subsequent repre-
sentation of a living life-process. It is only an intuitive and presentive,
3 Heidegger, History of the Concept of Time, p. 76.
4 Heidegger, op. cit., p. 77.
5 Id I, §77, pp. 174, 144.
THE PROBLEM AND ITS BACKGROUND 35
perceptual experience that gives the object in person, in an original

mode. This means that reflection cannot grasp the life of the ego, and
its lived-experiences in the present mode of consciousness. Reflection
is always a recollection of what has already passed, or lived, by the
ego. As a result, phenomenology is a systematised ‘experience’, guid-
ed by a synthetical functional mode, and marked by an essential ir-
reducibility with regard to both the origin of its description, and the
original that is grasped through its examinations. It is probably this
aspect that propelled Levinas to try, contrary to the textual evidence,
to defend phenomenology as being only marginally an epistemologi-
cal inquiry and fundamentally an ontological study of the meaning
of being: ‘in guise of epistemology Husserl pursues interests that are
essentially ontological’6. It is also this possibility to accede to being,
by means of an immediate and an intuitive givenness, which can
open the question of singularity under different assumptions that
inclined Heidegger to affirm laconically: ‘phenomenology in the nar-
row sense as a phenomenology of constitution. Phenomenology in
the wide sense as something which includes ontology’7. Indeed, the
endeavour to accede to the heart of things, when transformed into
an abstractive, epistemological principle, becomes disloyal to the im-
mediacy of life.
The originality of being

Against Husserl’s discontent with natural life, concrete experi-
ence has to be accepted as the propaedeutics of all reflection. The
immediate grasping is that on which all representational thought
6 Levinas, TIH, p. 124.
7 Heidegger, Ontology-The Hermeneutics of Facticity (Bloomington & India-
napolis, Indiana University Press, 1999), p. 2. It is also important to note
the attempt of Merleau-Ponty to construct an endo-ontology, or of Michel
Henry to impose an ontological dimension to phenomenology.
is founded. Correspondingly, we have to infer that phenomenol-

ogy, in Husserl’s terms, being reflective in its essence, is derivative,
established on the natural living that it attempts to suspend. There
is givenness of life before a reflective turn towards past experiences.
The pre-eminence of the living ego over the reflecting one is the most
compelling evidence that phenomenology has to accept. Fink’s fa-
mous distinction between the operative medium of a philosophy and
its thematic conceptualisations points to the same inherent duality.
In Husserl’s case, the operative field that phenomenological themes
are grounded on, is formed by the life-world, the natural attitude, or
the non-thematic experience. These aspects constitute, to quote Fink,
‘the medium of seeing’, and ‘the shadow of [Husserl’s] philosophy’8.
In this context, the reduction represents, indeed, a remarkable effort
to solve the split between the operative and the thematic dimensions
of phenomenology, and to come to terms with the living experience
and its non-objectified nature. As Fink claims, ‘Husserl’s philosophy
doesn’t just “operate” with the distinction of theme and operation, it
also thematises it expressly’9. But the attempt to get as close as pos-
sible to the mundane field of life, by maintaining its specificity in
relation to the transcendental, is not successful. The ‘methodologi-
cal schizophrenia’, to use again one of Fink’s expressions, remains
acute despite a continuous endeavour to radicalise the reduction.
The tension between reflection and experience is, in reality, an opera-
tive medium itself that can become thematic only by assigning other
elements to the shadow of its discourse. This is, in fact, one of the
points that Heidegger fails to notice in his critical reading of Husserl’s
texts. Thus, considering the major issue in phenomenology to be
8 E. Fink, ‘Operative Concepts in Husserl’s Phenomenology’, (Apriori and
World, W. McKenna, R. M. Harlan & L. E. Winters eds., The Hague,
Martinus Nijhoff, 1981, pp. 56-70).
9 E. Fink, art. cit., p. 63.
the one of the being of the thematic rather than the thematic itself,
Heidegger asserts that ‘the question of being is not an optional and
merely possible question, but the most urgent question inherent in
the very sense of phenomenology itself’10. Going back to the ground
of reflection, Heidegger is nevertheless not aware that his entire criti-
cal project operates within a reflective mode. Thus, the question of
the sense of being, which is not opened by Husserl due to the limita-
tions imposed by his method, is in reality another type of reflection:
‘the reflection upon being as such is phenomenologically even more
necessary’11. Consequently, the tension remains unsolved.
Husserl is constantly aware of the limitation of the reflective sub-
ject. As a proof, we can find in Crisis12 the following affirmation:
it is rationality which, discovering again and again its unsatisfy-
ing relativity, is driven on its toils, in its will to attain the true
and full rationality. But finally it discovers that this rationality is
an idea residing in the infinite and is de facto necessarily [only]
on the way13.
Correspondingly, the genetic ‘turn’ in Husserl’s work unveils a

different focus with regard to sensibility and the pre-reflective inten-
tional life. If the general context of the investigation is still reflective,
through the disclosure of pre-givenness, Husserl breaches the pure
epistemological concern for experience. Allowing for an element of
inexplicability, phenomenology confronts its own limits by accept-
ing the idea of a gift, pre-given to the active focus of reflection. It
is true that Husserl has never renounced the reflective ideal of his
program, but he stresses better the limitations of this model and the
10 M. Heidegger, History of the Concept of Time, p. 115.
11 M. Heidegger, op. cit., p. 102.
12 C, App. IV ‘Philosophy as Mankind’s Self-Reflection’, pp. 335-341.
13 C, App. IV, p. 339.
manner in which original donation enters the framework of phe-

nomenology. Nonetheless, the major point of perspective remains
the reflective thinking. To this extent, it is legitimate to ask ourselves
if ‘the reflection does not substitute to the original and spontaneous
living experience a reflective one, which transforms into an object
that which was originally an act. The method does not contradict
the project?14. Nevertheless, if the method seems to be incompatible
with the general goal of descriptively approaching the primitive, con-
crete living, the tension cannot be dogmatically solved.
Description vs. presumption

As we have already noted, to the previous question is related the
descriptive nature of a phenomenological investigation. In Ideas I
we find the definition of phenomenology as ‘a purely descriptive
discipline, exploring the field of transcendentally pure conscious-
ness by pure intuition’15. Phenomenology attempts a descriptive
examination of intentional consciousness16 in relation to the stream
of its lived experiences. The regulative ideal for phenomenology is
veritable science, i.e. science that is presuppositionless, based on
apodictical evidence and authentic principles, having general va-
lidity. However, the descriptive imperative to full givenness seems
to be just an idea that belongs to infinity. In fact, phenomenol-
14 Didier Franck, Chair et corps (Eds. de Minuit, Paris, 1981), p. 38.
15 Id I, pp. 136, 113.
16 Intentionality itself is problematic in its imperative to full donation since,
as F. D. Sebbah remarks, ‘if it succeeds, it dies. An absolute donation im-
plies a reduction of all distance between the seeing and the seen. But, the
seeing and the seen exist only by means of this distance, which, distancing
them, brings them together into a relation and gives them to each other’
(L’ épreuve de la limite. Derrida, Henry, Levinas et la phénomenologie, Paris,
PUF, 2001, p.49). Thus, the notion of intentionality is the locus of a tension
that is to be found at all the levels of the phenomenological discourse.
ogy can only achieve approximations, and construct, in infinitum,

presumptive rather than absolute ideas. Its task to become meta-
critical means that it has to confront its own principles in order to
be consistent with its claim to found absolute science. Since it lacks
the possibility of any completeness, its radical turn against dog-
matic presuppositions also has to be an awareness of its imperfect
and unfinished self-givenness. Accordingly, phenomenology is to
remain forever caught into a pre-critical project, which it perpetu-
ates despite its anguish to block non-evidence. Striving for pure
immanence, Husserl discovers that this can only be a norm, rather
than radical givenness. Faithful description, thus, brackets itself out
as being already just an unfulfilled ideal and a mere illusion. This
is also the case with the postulate of an indifferent spectator – the
actor of the reductive move. In reality, the ‘things themselves’ refuse
to be given rigorously to descriptive thought, and, for this matter,
their givenness forms an assumed ideal goal. Pointing to the same
critical aspect, one could invoke Adorno’s observation that:
every universal principle of a first, even that of facticity in radi-

cal empiricism, contains abstraction within it. Even empiricism
could not claim an individual entity here and now, or fact as first,
but rather only the principle of the factical in general. The first
and the immediate is always, as a concept, mediated and thus
not the first17.
But to accept the idea that the pre-conceptual is reflectively pos-
sible only as conceptually mediated is not to repeat the Hegelian
insight into the pre-theoretical, lived experience. For Husserl, even
17 T. Adorno, Against Epistemology, (Blackwell, Oxford, 1982), p. 7. This ob-
servation, through which we question the reflective and representational
dimension of Husserl’s phenomenology, cannot though grasp, without
simplification, the post-Husserlian movements in phenomenology, which
address, more explicitly, this issue.
if only in an aporetic attempt18, the ‘things themselves’ have more

to ‘say’ than their conceptual grasping. On the contrary, concepts
are continuously guided by this living and intentionally given pres-
ence. Nonetheless, phenomenology cannot ever be completely de-
scriptive19 because pure exactness in the reflective encounter of the
living acts is never accomplished. Thus, the presumptive dimen-
sion of a phenomenological investigation, which encompasses the
whole issue of representational thought vs. pre-reflective life, is to
remain a fundamental aspect of it. What this means is that the
origin of our descriptions can never be brought to focus, whilst
the givenness that forms the basis of phenomenology is never com-
pletely given, i.e. a non-presumptive original. But if the descriptive
imperative is merely declamatory, then is phenomenology no more
presumptive than language itself?
An ‘unfaithful’ hermeneutics
Stated as a principle, descriptive thought is no more than an idea
that points to the imperfection of all actual verbalism. Nevertheless, if
realism is no more real than any other prescriptive dictum, the require-
18 Cf. R. Bruzina’s argument (‘The transcendental Theory of Method in Phenom-
enology; the Meontic and Deconstruction’, Husserl Studies, 14, 1997, pp. 75-
94) about the fundamental aporia of Husserl’s phenomenological description.
19 In this respect, we reject M. Farber’s contentment with the achievements of
the descriptive method in phenomenology. As he notes in ‘The Ideal of a Pre-
suppositionless Philosophy’, (Phenomenology. The Philosophy of Edmund Hus-
serl and Its Interpretation, J. J. Kockelmans ed., New York, Anchor, 1967, pp.
37-58), ‘there need be no narrowness; nothing need be inaccessible to a truly
descriptive method’. But the problematic aspect of phenomenology is that it
remains presumptive throughout its attempts to become purely descriptive.
Furthermore, the idea that it has the potential of reaching description (‘the
thoroughgoing justification of this method is not accomplished at one stroke,
but must be achieved progressively’) has to be doubted.
ment to comply with things themselves has to bring us further than

the inherent limits of any discursive description. And, if this is the case,
then the best way to understand and be faithful to the phenomenologi-
cal discourse is to reject the solidification of its norm. The validity of
its principle depends, thus, on the effort to render its results contro-
versial and insufficient in their grounds20. It is the same strategy that
Derrida suggests in his response to Levinas’s work as to the possibility of
maintaining the ethical Saying. Indeed, if phenomenological purity is
preserved by constant reductive efforts, then the only responsible reply
to the Saying of the absolute givenness is not the commentary, which
perpetuates a formal approach to the factical, but the dislocation of
‘all contract of acknowledgement’21. Thus, the most faithful reading of
Husserl’s claim to radical beginning is ingratitude and betrayal. To use
Derrida’s words, we can say at the end of every effort to cohere to the
demand of going back to the things themselves.
I should have been more unfaithful to him, more ungrateful, but

was it not in order to give myself up to what his work says about
the Work: that it provokes ingratitude? Here to absolute ingrati-
tude, the least foreseeable in his work itself ’22.
Thus, measuring Husserl’s thought against its own assumptions

is the highest form of respect for the phenomenological procedure
20 It is to this demand that F.-D. Sebbah abides when he defines phenomenology
not as a set of problems, but as a field of aporias, insisting though that ‘aporia
[is] neither an error as non-truth, nor a problem that promises the truth , but
rather suspension’ (op.cit., p.303). That is to say, phenomenology is not only a
nullification of the natural attitude, but also of the potentiality to formulate
principles as such since, as Sebbah observes, the possibility of phenomenology
is unveiled solely through the realisation of its impossibility (p.304).
21 J. Derrida, ‘At this very moment in this work here I am’, (in Textes pour E.
Levinas, F. Laruelle ed., pp. 11-67), p. 39.
22 J. Derrida, art. cit., p. 46.
of describing the non-prejudiced givenness of things. Without re-

ductively assimilating Derrida’s deconstruction to a mere critical
discourse, we want to suggest that, similarly, a meta-critical per-
spective is the most advanced understanding of the insightful pro-
gram of phenomenology. As the greatest enemy of the spirit of a
phenomenological examination is its own letter23, the relapse into
dogmatism, the primacy of existential givenness has to constitute
our major imperative. It is then the hermeneutics of phenomenol-
ogy that is brought into focus with this approach. The hermeneutic
dimension can be seen under two possible angles: the interpretative
role of the one approaching the phenomenological work through
its own textual reference; and the interpretation that is already at
work in phenomenology itself. It is to the latter aspect that the pre-
sumptive core of a phenomenological account points to. If it is true
that description encompasses a limitative imperative, then the pre-
sumptive side of the phenomenological method has to be integrat-
ed into a hermeneutical context. Indeed, as Ricoeur seems to sug-
gest, ‘phenomenology remains the unsurpassable presupposition of
hermeneutics’24 insofar as both of them recognise that questions re-
lated to beings are in fact interrogations about the meaning of their
being meant. Yet, ‘phenomenology cannot constitute itself without
a hermeneutical presupposition’25. That is to say, against the ‘ideal-
23 On the relation between the text, its interpretation and the problem of
phenomenology, cf. also E. Fink, ‘The Problem of the Phenomenology of
Edmund Husserl’ (Apriori and World, W. McKenna, R. M. Harlan & L.
E. Winters eds., The Hague, Martinus Nijhoff, 1981, pp. 12-55).
24 P. Ricoeur, ‘Phenomenology and Hermeneutics’, in Hermeneutics and the
Human Sciences (Cambridge, C.U.P., 1995, pp. 101-28), p. 101.
25 P. Ricoeur, art.cit., p. 101. On the necessary presupposition of a hermeneu-
tic procedure in Husserl’s phenomenology, cf. also J. Grondin (‘Husserl
et l’herméneutique’, Phénoménologie et herméneutique II, Lausanne, Éds.
Payot Lausanne, 2001, pp. 55-68). The second part of this book will unveil
istic’ form of discourse that one finds in Husserl’s phenomenology,

hermeneutics introduces a critical moment that is more faithful to
the givenness of things than to its formulation. In this respect, it
is important to delegate the question of origin to the impossibil-
ity of a radical givenness. The origin, along with the original, is
not of the order of intuition, but of the one of construction and
interpretation. It is in this sense that the presumptive represents an
unremitting aspect of phenomenology. Interpretation proves to be
essential to intuitive givenness, allowing for the origin to be pre-
given with regard to the act of understanding. That is, ‘all interpre-
tation places the interpreter in medias res and never at the begin-
ning or the end’26. It is this openness, imposed by interpretation
on the idea of full givenness, that the presumptive aspect suggests.
However, the moment of interpretation has to be supplemented by
a suspicion inhabiting the act of interpretation. The constitutional
side of phenomenology, which surpasses mere description, has to
be meta-critical. At the same time, phenomenology has to accept
the belonging together of intuition and explication, or, as Ricoeur
expresses it, ‘all phenomenology is an explication of evidence and
an evidence of explication. An evidence which is explicated, an ex-
plication which unfolds evidence’27.
Hermeneutics and singularity

As we have previously determined, the descriptive necessarily
contains a prescriptive core due to the incongruity between repre-
more complex mechanisms between constitution and interpretation, by
means of a doubling of language, time and phenomenality present in the
works of Levinas and Henry.
26 P. Ricoeur, art. cit., p. 108.
sentational thought and the non-abstractive reality that it attempts

to grasp. In opposition to representation, experience seems to be
based on singularities that escape unification. But is not this idea
a return to an ontological thesis, which posits the world as formed
by dissimilar singulars? Constructing equivalence is, indeed, the
surrogate of thought because life itself seems to point to an irre-
trievable field that refuses lawfulness. In this context, we could af-
firm that reflection is the abandonment of singularity, of the things
themselves if, as Levinas notes, ‘going back to the things themselves
signifies first of all not limiting oneself to words, which intend only
an absent reality’28. Nothing is more important to phenomenology
than faithfulness to lived experiences and a veritable acknowledge-
ment of life. But does the phenomenological program contradict
life in its singularity? Is phenomenology another form of episte-
mological totalitarianism, a relapse into synthetic identity? Is life
itself a dogmatic assumption, which cannot be given in terms of
experience, but is only postulated as existing as such? The question
of singularity is the problem that we have to debate in this work in
order to decide whether or not absolute phenomenology can offer a
positive account of its presumptive core. Together with the origin,
the original, which represents one of the main presuppositions of a
phenomenological elucidation, has to be revised in order to incor-
porate an examination of its own possible givenness. Nonetheless,
the hermeneutical ground of givenness, which has been emphasised
through the presence of a presumptive core within any description,
seems to contradict once more singularity. This is captured in the
observation that ‘to interpret is to render near what is far’29. In this
sense, interpretation appears to be a synthetic appropriation, rather
than a complete disclosing of the singular. It is true that distanc-
28 Levinas, DEH, p. 95.
ing is an important part of a hermeneutical program. However, the

distance that is necessary in interpretation is always the initiation
of understanding as return. Thus, if it is accurate to a certain extent
to say that interpretation is involved in every phenomenological ac-
count of the given, hermeneutics seems to fail to go beyond a syn-
thetic thought. In shifting attention from the constituting pole to
the constituted world of experience, hermeneutics introduces toler-
ance within the claim to absoluteness that has vitiated phenomenol-
ogy. Thus, conferring modesty to the scope of the transcendental
ego, the proposition of a hermeneutic phenomenology achieves an
insight into the impossibility of pure description. In this sense, in-
terpretation seems to respond to the idea of phenomenology as an
‘infinite task’ since it constitutes ‘an open process which no single
vision can conclude’30. But if the presupposition of a consciousness
oriented towards meaning appears as according to the sense of a
hermeneutic phenomenology, it is still doubtful whether or not, the
necessity of interpretation can respond to the challenge of singular-
ity. That is to say, the production involved in interpretation is still
a synthesis of the heterogeneous. If we return to the first author
that has formulated the idea of a hermeneutical phenomenology, we
find the same idea at work. Developing an interest in the modality
of factual being, hermeneutics is, for Heidegger, an interrogation
into the possibility of being. Interpretation is, from this perspec-
tive, an engagement into the situational possibilities of being. It is
Dasein’s self-encounter, in such a way that ‘there is no “generality”
in hermeneutical understanding’, but rather only factual realities31.
It seems, thus, that hermeneutics develops, indeed, awareness for
the singular in its living, and not a conceptual appropriation. The
emphasis on facticity is, however, misleading since Heidegger accen-
31 M. Heidegger, Ontology-Hermeneutics of Facticity, p. 14.
tuates the presence of a ‘directive’ within every hermeneutical situ-

ation, ‘co-given’ as a ‘direction of filling it out’32. If interpretation is
a possible how of Dasein’s being, it is yet impossible to escape the
constructional moment inherent into every approach to facticity. In
this sense, formulations like ‘descriptive interpretation’33, or ‘con-
crete hermeneutical descriptions’34, appear to have already operated
a shift from Husserl’s definition of descriptive investigation, while
leaving the problem unsolved. Regarding the question of singular-
ity, the hermeneutical turn does not supplement our insight into
the possibility of the non-synthetical. Exemplifying the same point,
Heidegger declares that familiarity ‘is not simply a characteristic of
comprehension, but rather a mode of being-encountered of the be-
ings-which-are-there themselves’35. Accordingly, ‘only on the basis
of this familiarity can something “strange” come forth’. Reminding
us of Levinas’s discourse, Heidegger’s account of the singular encom-
passes expressions such as: the ‘unfamiliar’, the one that ‘comes at an
inconvenient time’ and ‘is uncomfortable’, ‘disturbing’, ‘awkward’,
has the character of ‘a pronounced oppressiveness’, or ‘comes down
like a storm’. However, even with this hermeneutical insistence on
the factual, the so-called singular can only be a ‘for-the-most-part-
somehow-otherwise’, a ‘comparative’ datum, ‘otherwise than one
thought’36. In this situation, the familiar, the synthesis becomes the
ground for the unfamiliar. The factual being, even when approached
unreflectively, is still experienced as commonality. So, where are we
to find singularity? Why are we ‘operating’ with concepts such as sin-
gularity, and how far does experience reach in legitimising this desig-
nator? At stake is not only the mission of phenomenology to achieve

intuitive insight into the reality of being, but also the possibility of
bridging the limits of a comparative discourse about that which we
experience. But is not talk about singularity another contract with
ontological theses about what being might be, independently of the
way we give it? And is singularity not speculative and dogmatic, a
simple attempt to say the radical nature of the other, and, also, the
uniqueness of my own subjectivity? If we cannot legitimise singular-
ity, can a world given in grey shades satisfy our request for contrasts?
Indeed, if analogy is the key aspect of the way in which the world of
experience is constructed, then the other is no more than a partially
other, and myself, another other. It is this logic of the neutral that
has to be open to discussion in the examination of singularity. If ex-
perience is also interpretation, how do we account for the meaning
that surpasses our constitutive powers? Is phenomenology, the most
faithful discourse on intuitive givenness, doomed to fail? Embracing
both the condition of a post-Husserlian phenomenology, and the
possibility of an interpretative approach to phenomenology in gen-
eral, this problematic background allows us now to return to the clas-
sical locus of phenomenology, i.e. Husserl’s texts, and to re-open the
question of singularity. What we are looking for are clues that might
direct us to the possibility of a phenomenology of the singular. With
this purpose in mind, we will attempt to construct our own reading
of Husserl’s potential acceptance of singularity.
Defining singularity with Husserl

In the Third Logical Investigation, Husserl affirms that the dis-
tinction between dependent and non-dependent contents ‘is [the]
most important [one] for all phenomenological investigations’37
37 LI, p. 435.
insofar as it encompasses the entire field of constituted objects. In

general, objects are united to each other in relations of wholes to
parts, or as parts of a whole38. The parts themselves can be indepen-
dent from each other; that is to say, they can exist independently
and enter into the formation of new wholes without a necessary
connection to each other. These parts can be contents of different
wholes and can, as a result, be presented as elements of different
connections. Husserl defines a part in the following way: ‘everything
is a part that is an object’s real possession, not only in the sense of
being a real thing, but also in the sense of being something really in
something, that truly helps to make it up’39. This definition, while
pointing to the possibility of a discursive distinction between non-
real objectivity and real objects, obscures though the separation
that the reduction introduces with regard to the part-whole rela-
tion. Thus, the discussion of parts of real objects has to be put into
perspective with the performance of the reductive move.
In relation to the wholes in which they are integrated, parts are
divided into two main classes: those that can be presented inde-
pendently, and the ones that are non-independent. The formers are
called ‘pieces’, and can be imagined as separated from the wholes
into which they appear. Furthermore, Husserl notices that a dis-
tinction has to be made between the parts of an objective unity
- the thing in itself as it is presupposed to exist in the world, and
the experience of a thing, which, from a phenomenological stand-
point, belongs to the very definition of transcendence.
Husserl also points to the possibility of isolability with regard
to contents. In other words, an isolated content is the one ‘in the
“nature” [of which], in its ideal essence, no dependence on other
contents is rooted’40. Or, stated differently, isolation means here ‘that
38 LI, p. 436.
39 LI, p. 437.
40 LI, p. 443.
it is possible to present the object as something existing by itself, as

independently there in the face of all other objects’41. The ‘ability-to-
exist-by-itself ’ of the independent part implies that the content has
the potential of being a whole itself. The distinction between whole
and parts is a relative and formal relation that can be applied to dif-
ferent elements and contexts. Thus, a thing, which can be viewed as
composed of distinctive parts also plays the role of a content when
the ensemble of things in the background of an attentive perception
is concerned. It is our relation to things that decides upon the per-
spective of the whole-part relation.
In the light of these distinctions, it is possible to construct a hier-
archy, which starts with the underlying, simplest parts and develops
from the non-mediated contents to the mediated ones, and then to
unities that cannot become parts of more inclusive wholes anymore.
The ground of this hierarchy is formed by non-compounded ele-
ments, which do not include any other parts and cannot be frag-
mented in simpler moments. At the top, there are the broadest wholes
that cannot be parts of more incorporating wholes. This ordering can
provide the main framework for defining singularity within a phe-
nomenological discourse. In particular, it is important to examine
the potential configurations of singularity and to enlighten the man-
ner in which phenomenology deals with them.
To start with, singularity can mean ultimate specificity, which
refers to non-compounded elements. In the hierarchy of parts and
wholes, these singulars are the simplest ones, the non-mediated and
non-synthetic data that do not have parts. These sensible singulars
point to the simple concreteness, or to the brute, sensuous hyle,
which represent the lowest constitutive substrate, the indivisible.
The first chapter of our attempt to define singularity with Husserl
will be devoted to scrutinising the singular nature of sense-data.
41 LI, p. 445.
But singularity can also denote, in the common parlance, partic-

ularity, or manifold individualities. These are independent synthetic
poles that relate to lower level units. In this respect, particulars are
pluralities of qualities, individually ordered sets of elements, which
articulate, in singular generic formations, the subordinated parts. In
this definition of singularity is included, on the side of the transcen-
dental, the monad with its specific substrate of habitual aspects, and,
on the transcendent side, mundane objects. Individuals are, thus,
autonomous singulars that can exist independently and present par-
ticular, synthetic configurations. However, if they are unique in the
togetherness of their aspects, they can also be integrated into more
inclusive manifolds, into multiplicities that can form in themselves
further unities. Thus, in the case of a monadic individuality, there is
the possibility to model communities of transcendental individuals,
whereas in the context of transcendent things, diverse horizons, or
ample perspectives can be presented. The second chapter of our first
part will discuss this definition of singularity as manifold-unity with
its less restrictive denotative area.
Thirdly, one can also stress the connection that exists between
singularity and uniqueness. In this context, being singular means
being non-numerically one, without possible multiplication, or re-
production. But how does givenness open to uniqueness in the
formative phenomenological project? In our third chapter, an in-
vestigation of unicity within the context of Husserlian philosophy
will bring forth the ultimate structures of transcendental tempo-
rality: time as an eternal and singular form that makes possible
the flowing of temporal phenomena. Likewise, the spatial nexus
that forms a unique unity, which encompasses the appearing of
perceptual objects, will also be considered in its singularity as the
total world-ground that cannot be ever multiplied. Singularity, un-
derstood in these terms, corresponds to the ultimate wholes in the
hierarchy of fragments and unities: the transcendental absoluteness

is, thus, the time-constituting consciousness, while the all-inclusive
transcendence is world as total space.
With these preliminary distinctions in mind, let us investigate
more attentively the status of the singular in Husserl’s writings. The
study will develop following the lines sketched in the hierarchy of
parts and wholes, with a particular interest in the role that synthe-
ses play in the description of the singulars.
CHAPTER II
THE PRIMITIVE SENSE-DATA,
OR NON-COMPOUNDED SINGULARS
1. Hyle: a problematic approach
In the fourth section of the introduction to Being and

Nothingness, Sartre underlines several critical points that have to
be examined in relation to Husserl’s approach to consciousness.
Among these problematic assumptions which form the basis of
Husserl’s phenomenology, Sartre mentions the relation between
intentional forms and the animated sensuous matter, or the purely
subjective hyletic elements. As Sartre points out, the introduction
of hyle, as a passive moment, into noesis creates significant dif-
ficulties within the Husserlian philosophical project. The reason
is that the theory of hyletic data fails to explain adequately how
consciousness can relate to the world. As Sartre states,
even if we grant to Husserl that there is hyletic stratum for the
noesis, we cannot conceive how consciousness can transcend
this subjective toward objectivity. In giving to the hyle both the
characteristics of a thing and the characteristics of consciousness,
Husserl believed that he facilitated the passage from the one to
the other, but he succeeded only in creating a hybrid being which
consciousness rejects and which can not be part of the world1.
Accordingly, Husserl’s conception of hyletic data, though attempt-

ing to explain the way in which consciousness relates to transcendent
objects, seems, on the contrary, to accentuate the difficulty of the en-
tire project. Adorno presents a similar criticism in the following lines:
1 J. P. Sartre, Being and Nothingness (Routledge, London, 2000), p. xxxv.
Sensation, the lowest level of the traditional hierarchy of mind, as

of the Husserlian phenomenologically pure consciousness, marks
a threshold. The material element simply cannot be rooted out
of it. Bordering on physical pain and organic desire, it is a bit of
nature, which cannot be reduced to subjectivity2.
In the description of the hyletic data, there seems to be an abstract

core, created in an artificial manner to solve the problems revealed
by the intricacy of the intentional relation of the transcendental
ego. The issue underlined above captures the attempt to bridge the
separation between the singularity of life, and its phenomenologi-
cal givenness, as meant correlate of consciousness. However, if hyle
is situated in the ultimate vicinity of the transcendent, it is ques-
tionable if sensations are mere descriptive data, or, on the contrary,
conceptual fragmentations of higher intentional nexuses. In order
to assess the validity of the above-mentioned arguments, it is crucial
to unveil the complex ground that configures the theory of hyle in
Husserl’s phenomenological investigation. The aim of this inquiry
is to assess the possibility of hyletic singularity since, as we have
already noted, the sensuous elements are the underlying foundation
for intentionality and, at the same time, the maximal specification
that can occur in the hierarchy of wholes and contents.
2. The matter / form scheme and its limitations

A non-intentional hyle
The theoretical delimitation of hyle in Husserl’s texts is, at first,
always integrated into the matter/form schema, which appears in
the context of intentional analyses as set out in Logical Investigations.
The matter is here defined as the element through which reference
2 T. Adorno, op. cit., p. 155.
THE PRIMITIVE SENSE-DATA 55
to an object is made possible3. In the course of intentional experi-

ence, two constituents are to be determined: the sensuous contents,
which function as presentational moments, and the proper inten-
tional act, which is also an interpretative form. With regard to the
former, Husserl observes that ‘they themselves are not acts, but acts
are constituted through them, wherever, that is, intentional charac-
ters like a perceptual interpretation lay hold on them, and as it were
animate them’4. To the question of whether we ever experience non-
intentional sense-data, Husserl seems to give an ambiguous answer
asserting that there are some sensations, like the pain of a burn, the
sensation of smooth or green, which do not contain anything inten-
tional in their essence. At the same time, though, he accepts the pos-
sibility of intentional sense-data in some particular cases5.
It is, however, in Ideas I, §85 that Husserl offers one of the most
comprehensive explanations of the meaning of the term ‘hyle’,
pointing out the necessity to distinguish, within the stream of ab-
solute subjectivity, between intentional, or noetic components,
and non-intentional, or sensuous data6. While the first animate
the second ones and transform them into ‘components of more
inclusive concrete mental processes which are intentive as wholes’7,
the sensuous moments have in themselves ‘nothing pertaining to
intentionality’8. It is important to note that the same non-inten-
tional aspect is emphasised in certain paragraphs of the analyses of
time-consciousness, where Husserl observes that
3 LI 2, V, §20, p. 588-89.
4 LI 2, V, §15b, p. 573.
5 LI 2, V, §15b, p. 572-573.
6 Cf. also §36 where Husserl affirms that all data of sensations are non-inten-
tional. (Id I, pp. 75, 65).
7 Id I, pp. 203, 172.
8 Id I, pp. 203, 172.
all impressions, primary contents as well as experiences that are

“consciousness of…”, become constituted in original conscious-
ness. For experiences divide into these two fundamental classes:
experiences in the one class are acts, are “consciousness of…”, are
experiences that “refer to something”; experiences in the other
class are not. The sensed colour does not refer to something9.
In this sense, sensuous contents are defined as not being them-

selves intentional, but as mere ‘bearers’ of intentional or primal
apprehensions10. Hyle, together with the meaning-bestowing ap-
prehensions, which constitute unifying syntheses, fix the limits of
noeses. In addition, these sensuous, or hyletic data, are distinct
from the physical qualities of the real object (colour, shape, etc).
In this sense, in §97 of Ideas I11, Husserl differentiates the hyletic
moments from the objective components. To illustrate, the percep-
tion of a tree trunk implies a fundamental distinction between the
colour of the actual tree, which cannot be included in the mental
act of perception, and the sensed colour, which is an inherent part
of this act. Hyletic data are non-objective, stuff-moments, or sen-
sation-data (colour-data, touch-data, etc) which the perception of
the real object mobilises in order to direct itself intentionally to the
objective phenomenon. As a result, these subjective moments rep-
resent the animated stuff that permits the formation of objectivity
in an intentional act, of noema12. That is to say, these hyletic-data
9 PCIT, pp. 94, 89.
10 PCIT, pp. 96, 92.
11 Id I, pp. 237, 202.
12 Noema, which refers to the object experienced in the way it is experienced,
is distinguished by Husserl from noesis, or the acts of consciousness that,
by means of sensuous contents, intend a certain object. The definition of
noemata has been a controversial issue for Husserl’s scholars, particular-
ly with regard to perceptual experience. In this sense, I follow Suzanne
Cuningham’s argument (‘Perceptual Meaning and Husserl’) that there is
‘sketch’ a corresponding objectivity that consciousness intends.

However, Husserl tends to consider the region of hyle as a less rich
domain when compared to the purely intentive mental processes.
From a functional perspective hyletic-data constitute just a stratum
that makes possible further intentive formations. Accordingly, the
hyletic stratum is characterised in a negative manner as being de-
void of intentional directness and a mere secondary material for
intentive processes. Consequently, hyletic-phenomenology is to be
subordinated to the noetic one13.
The same idea is expressed in Thing and Space, when Husserl
investigates the constitution of a perceptual object. The duality be-
tween non-intentional contents, and the animating apprehensions
is preserved as an explanatory framework for the manner in which
perceptual intending is constituted. In this sense, Husserl affirms
that ‘the contents of sensation in themselves still contain nothing
of the character of perception, nothing of its directedness toward
the one perceived object’14. Thus, the sense-data function as pre-
sentational contents, rather than as independent, intentional ele-
a difference between perceptual and other noemata (eg. those involved in
logical or mathematical judgements). This distinction, suggested before
by R. Solomon (‘Husserl’s Concept of Noemata’, Husserl: Expositions and
Appraisals, ed. F. Elliston, Notre Dame, 1977) makes possible the refuta-
tion of Dagfinn Føllesdal view (‘Noema and Meaning in Husserl’) that all
noemata are, ‘abstract entities’, corresponding to the notion of meaning
(p.265). It is indeed the case that noemata are abstract in some situations
(eg. mathematical judgement), but the particularity of perceptual experi-
ence brings forth a different type of noemata. As Cunningham notes in her
article, perceptual noema, the perceived as such, is neither a perceivable
object, nor an abstract entity. On the contrary, it is a context-dependent
element, determined by a specific situation (e.g. my perception of this par-
ticular table, at this particular moment).
13 Id I, pp. 210, 178.
14 DR, pp. 39, 45.
ments. Furthermore, Husserl qualifies these contents as being ‘dead

matter’15, which need ‘an interpretative apprehension’16 in order to
have perceptual consequence. Once again, the physical data and
apprehensions are to be distinguished insofar as their role in per-
ception is concerned: ‘a physical datum and the apprehensions not
only differ fundamentally and in essence, but it is also clear that
their functions are not interchangeable’17.
An intentional hyle
The lectures on time preserve a certain formal structure when
it comes to the material becoming of the constituted temporal ob-
ject. However, they also impose an alteration to the form animat-
ing hyletic matter. Indeed, it is the immanent dimension of tempo-
rality that forces a reconsideration of the matter/form schema. In
this respect, it is important to put into perspective the problematic
of hyle and the questions emerging from it, by discussing internal
time-consciousness. The hyletic content of time and the acts that
relate to it reveal original characteristics that are to be explained
within a hyletic phenomenology.
As modes of impressional consciousness, the primal impression,
retention and protention, need to be considered in relation to the
immediately given hyletic flux of sensuous data, which is revealed in
time-consciousness. But is it on this particular point that Husserlian
phenomenology achieves the deepest insight into the question of hyle?
Or is time-consciousness, on the contrary, the final proof of Husserl’s
failure to offer a decisive answer to the interrogations that arise from
the investigation of hyle? Michel Henry tends to respond affirma-
tively to the latter question when he stresses the fact that it is ‘when
15 DR, pp. 39, 46.
16 DR, pp. 41, 48.
17 DR, pp. 41, 47.
it goes into the <depth> of archi-constitution, that Husserlian phe-

nomenology suffers the most spectacular, the most significant and
the most decisive failure concerning the Impression’18. For Henry,
the texts on time-consciousness, the most fascinating ones from
the corpus of Husserlian philosophy, fail dramatically to expose the
veritable and radical sense of a hyletic phenomenology and return
to the classical thinking, concealing the Essential and enforcing the
modes of intentional light19. In this sense, Husserlian phenomenol-
ogy holds that impression is a sort of proto-intentionality20, defined
by its role in the process of constitution. But intentionality itself
is given, in the primary context of its self-donation, as impression.
Indeed, the form/matter relation has to be conceptually readjusted
in order to integrate the passivity of the form – form that is located
in itself and defined in its fundamental being by impression. Hyle,
as secondary matter included in constituting processes, has to be
replaced by impression – pure hyletic sensibility, which has not
received the negative contamination of intentional consciousness,
standing in itself as real subjectivity.
Taking into consideration the previously discussed aspects, the
analysis of the role the hyletic datum plays in the continual flow
through which temporal objects are given to consciousness21 is a ma-
18 Henry, PM, p. 32.
19 PM, p. 31.
20 PM, p. 32.
21 Though time-consciousness and association are described as the most funda-
mental levels of genetic constitution in CM (pp.142, 169), it is necessary to
distinguish the analyses directed to hyle from those that are grounded in the
formal structure of time-consciousness. Thus, the problematic of time opens
the way to genetic constitution only with regard to the transformation, the
flowing of contents and apprehensions and not with respect to the tripartite
form of time-consciousness itself, which is a stable and unchanging abstrac-
tive structure. However, the temporal becoming of hyle is a step further into
the investigation of hyletic phenomenology that Id I has set forth, insofar as
it reveals the genetic basis of the permanent modification of contents.
jor one. The limitations of the form/matter approach to hyle can be

better traced in the lectures on time-consciousness. From this perspec-
tive, Ideas I remains tributary to a static reflection, which overlooks
the originating genesis of the becoming of hyletic contents. Indeed,
the distinction between ‘matter’ and ‘form’, which operates at a static
level, is just an abstraction, or a theoretical construct that leaves out
the fact that a pure phenomenological ground does not present hyle
and animating acts separately, but as originating together.
According to the texts on time, the hyletic content itself (e.g.
a tone-content) undergoes temporal modifications, commencing in
the mode of the now and receding, as enduring, into a retentional
mode. However, as Husserl points out, ‘the retentional tone is not
a present tone but precisely a tone “primarily remembered” in the
now’22. The hyletic datum is part of the immanent time and, as a
result, is given, as every temporal object, in a continual flow. At first,
Husserl asserts that, in the case of an intended enduring tone, even if
the tone in itself remains the same, the hyletic data change continu-
ally, with regard not to content but to the form it is given in. From
the primal impression as the source-point of the appearing of a tem-
poral object, the hyletic contents fade away and become retentional
contents23. Thus, from fullness to emptiness, through a continuous
weakening, ‘the tone-now changes into a tone-having-been; the im-
pressional consciousness, constantly flowing, passes over into ever
22 PCIT, pp. 33, 31.
23 In this sense, the assimilation of hyletic contents to a timeless implicit
consciousness (as J. M. Tito suggests in her article ‘In praise of presence.
Rethinking presence with Derrida and Husserl’, Philosophy Today, Vol. 45,
no.2, 2001, pp. 154-67) demonstrates a misleading reading of the role of
the hyletic affection in Husserl’s work. Hyle has a constitutive role for the
active ego-pole and its time-constituting function. But this Uraffektion that
constitutes a primordial level of self-othering is not formal and atemporal
in the sense in which the tripartite ecstatic structure of absolute conscious-
ness is. Hyle has not only a temporalising role but is also temporalised.
new retentional consciousness’24. However, it is important to view

the temporal modification of the hyletic contents as being different
from a mere alteration of the same primary data by means of ap-
prehensions. The now-tone does not recede into the past as a result
of a modification with regard to modes of apprehension. In No.
49 Husserl states that, though related to apprehension, ‘that which
subsequently constitutes the temporal difference is an “apprehen-
sion” in a fundamentally different sense’25. It is this particular view
that marks the overcoming of the abstract and limiting schema that
Husserl used in his early work26. Indeed, if the sensuous elements
are temporal and part of the immanent flow, it is absurd to presup-
pose that their temporal constitution necessitates the dichotomy
of matter and form in order to be explained. The sense-data as
temporal objects imposes an infinite regression if the schema is to
be preserved. Furthermore, the apprehensions themselves are tem-
poral, but, since they are to be firmly distinguished from the sen-
suous matter, they cannot contain any sense-data to account for
their temporal characteristics. In the light of these observations, the
matter/form schema becomes superfluous insofar as the differences
between animating acts and sensuous stuff are not justified. The
hyletic elements and the intentional apprehensions are not distinct,
but belong indistinguishably to the same temporal flow.
Hyletic sensibility
It is interesting to see that Levinas’s commentary with regard to
the hyletic stratum reflects the development inherent in Husserl’s
24 PCIT, pp. 31, 29.
25 PCIT, pp. 333, 321.
26 For an account of the modifications imposed by the alteration of the matter/
form schema on the definition of constitution, Cf. R. Sokolowski, The Forma-
tion of Husserl’s Concept of Constitution (The Hague, Martinus Nijhoff, 1970).
genetic turn. In ‘On Ideas’27, published in 1929, Levinas adopts a

predominantly expository approach without surpassing the limits
of an interpretative commentary. Exposing the relevance of consti-
tutive problems, Levinas gives emphasis to the distinction between
a subjectively oriented phenomenology and an objectively oriented
one28. Scarcely thought about in Ideas, the subjectively oriented phe-
nomenology occupies a secondary place with regard to the objective
phenomenological orientation, which captivates Husserl’s primary
attention, in particular in the first volume of the same work. Insofar
as the intentional relation of consciousness to an object represents the
major challenge for the pure transcendental consciousness and, at the
same time, the essential characteristic of the sphere of consciousness,
the subjectively oriented phenomenology has to receive a secondary
role in the domain of constitutional problems. In this sense, an
analysis of material, or hyletic elements, though directly connected
to all the mental processes of conscious life, is consequential only
in relation to animating intentions, which ‘are bound together [to
the hyletic data] to give consciousness one sole, selfsame object’29.
However, it is not until 1959 that Levinas completely surmounts
the static view of sensuous, or hyletic data. Indeed, in ‘Reflection on
Phenomenological “Technique”’, his approach sets forth a positive ex-
amination and a productive assessment of phenomenological themes.
In this text, sensibility is valued as one of the major contributions
that the phenomenological turn has brought forth: ‘Phenomenology
is characterised by the considerable and original role that sensibility
plays for it in the work of truth’30. As Levinas remarks
sensibility is not considered as simple matter, crudely given, to
which a spontaneous act of thought is applied, whether to give
27 DEH, pp. 3-32.

28 DEH, p. 20.
29 DEH, p. 21.
30 DEH, p. 96.
it form or to bring out relations from it by abstraction…The new

way of treating sensibility consists in conferring upon it, in its very
obtuseness, and in its thickness, a signification and a wisdom of its
own and a kind of intentionality. The senses make sense31.
Attempting to unveil a positive dimension of the hyletic data,

Levinas points to a later development within the framework of the
Husserlian thinking. Thus, sensibility is to become the location of
a distinct life of subjectivity where the duality between receptivity
and spontaneity is not operational anymore. Expanding the sec-
ondary position that Husserl ascribes to hyletic moments in Ideas,
Levinas seems to reverse the importance accorded to sensuous ele-
ments in line with the genetic account present in the time lec-
tures. ‘Sensibility does not simply record facts; it unfolds a world
from which the highest works of spirit steam and from which they
will not be able to escape’32. Not a counterpart to the intentional
life of consciousness anymore, since hyle is intimately linked to
and ‘a kind of intentionality’ itself, sensibility tends to exhibit the
veritable subjective quality of the subject. Sensibility imprints the
constituted objects of consciousness, but in a completely particular
way. Within the real substance of the ego, hyle constitutes a dif-
ferent intentional directness that does not lend itself to an inten-
tional thinking of the other but remains within itself, constituting
the most fundamental root of subjectivity. As Levinas discerns, ‘a
weave of intentionalities can be perceived in the hyletic data them-
selves. These intentionalities are not a simple repetition of the in-
tentionality leading toward the non-ego, in which the localisation,
the weight of the ego, its now, are already forgotten’33. It is hyle
31 DEH, p. 98.
32 DEH, p. 98.
33 DEH, p. 98.
that comes closer to the hypostasis that Levinas evoked in his early
work, the site of subjectivity that pre-determines the intentional
going out of itself. Indeed, explaining the sense in which hyletic
moments are intentional, Levinas throws light on a new connota-
tion of intentionality, which is ascribed by sensibility as the null
point of the situating subject. Everything is constituted by means
of hyletic moments and in this act of constitution hyle touches
the edges of intentional directness. Sensibility ‘is ”intentional” in
that it situates all content, and is situated not in relation to objects
but in relation to itself. It is the zero point of situation, the origin
of the fact of being situated itself ’34. There is a remarkable coinci-
dence of terms between the way Levinas ascertains positively and
re-inscribes back in the Husserlian texts the original characteristic
of hyle, and the way subjectivity posits itself in hypostasis35. In this
sense, Levinas tends to assess sensibility as the very origin of the
subjective life and considers Husserl to be the creator of a totally
original approach to sensibility: ‘Husserl’s phenomenology inaugu-
rates this new notion of sensibility and subjectivity’36. Moreover, a
certain ambiguity, present in the way sensibility relates to the active
dimension of consciousness, represents a unique characteristic of
the subjectivity that Husserl reveals in his texts. The hyletic, pas-
sive and sensible stratum is intertwined with the active constituting
consciousness which directs itself through different syntheses to the
real object it constitutes. However, the internal relation between
hyle and intentional moments of consciousness blurs the distinc-
tion between ‘active and passive’. As Levinas stresses, ‘the ambigu-
ity of passivity and activity in the description of sensibility captures
in reality this new type of consciousness that will be one’s own
34 DEH, p. 99.
35 Cf. infra Ch. 4.2. Hypostasis: the singularity of the here.
36 DEH, p. 99.
body, the body-subject’37. Passivity is thus reversed as a new type of

activity, as an ‘infected’ category that arouses ambiguity.
Furthermore, Levinas ascribes to sensibility, as the origin of
consciousness, the role of breaking with the objectifying image of
subjectivity, conceived as a mere counter-pole of objects. Hyletic
data, even if subordinated to a certain extent in Husserl’s work to
an objectifying move ascribing to intentional acts the primacy over
the sensuous foundation of consciousness, represent the absolute
origin of subjectivity. In this sense, sensibility reveals truth and
fundamentally traces back any act of knowing. Hyle is the ground
for a new principle at work in Husserl’s philosophy: ‘There is truth
without there being representation’38.
In line with Husserl’s thought, Levinas remarks in an essay from
1965 (‘Intentionality and Sensation’) that the notion of sensation rep-
resents an unexpected element in intentional analyses constituting
the main theme of Husserl’s philosophy. As Levinas observes, ‘hyletic
data are found at the basis of intentionality. Sensation, far from play-
ing within the system the role of a residue that would progressively
be removed, occupies a more and more important role in Husserlian
meditations’39. But the major aspect that Levinas emphasises with
regard to hyle is the existence of a pre-reflective relation to itself.
Without objectifying and taking a reflective distance within itself,
hyletic subjectivity is the lived or felt consciousness. In this respect,
in defiance of the tendency to offer a doxic core to all mental acts,
hyle is the consciousness that evades any explicit self-reflection. Or,
to follow Levinas’s exposition, ‘consciousness that is consciousness
of the object is non-objectifying consciousness of itself’40. However,
the hyletic contents are conceived this time by Levinas as being non-
37 DEH, p. 99.
38 DEH, p. 102.
39 DEH, p. 138.
40 DEH, p. 138.
intentional – the domain of a consciousness which is not directed to

anything outside itself. This aspect is stressed in accordance with the
early development of Husserl’s philosophy that gives pre-eminence
to intentional life. Though depicted as non-independent and entirely
subordinated to intentionality and its strive to give real substance
to constituted objects, hyle is an aspect ‘too often analysed and pre-
sented as autonomous’41. The lived contents of subjective life are the
source of all intentional acts and, therefore, an essential element of
Husserl’s texts.
3. Hyle and life

Hyle: between intentionality and non-intentionality
From Levinas’s commentary on hyletic phenomenology, it ap-
pears that the problematic of sensuous data is of utmost impor-
tance for the investigation of the fracture between life and inten-
tional interpretation. Indeed, it seems that sensibility brings forth
the true meaning of subjective life and that the question concern-
ing the split, within consciousness, between hyletic and intentional
moments has to be re-opened in the light of the potential that
hyle reveals. In particular, the question of singularity, which is here
defined as radical specification, has to unveil the particular experi-
ence of hyle as non-interpretative and receptive. It is in this regard
that Husserl’s ideas struggle to account for life in a non-intentional
context.
To exemplify, in an attempt to discover the real essence of hyle,
Michel Henry devotes an entire chapter of his Phénoménologie ma-
térielle to the problematic of hyletic phenomenology. Referring to
the same paragraph from Ideas (§85), Henry endeavours to estab-
41 DEH, p. 139.
lish a constitutive hierarchy with regard to the relation between the

non-intentional, or hyletic moments, and intentional conscious-
ness. Indeed, commenting on the definition of hyletic phenom-
enology, Henry remarks that there are two dimensions that have
to be highlighted in order to determine the essential characteristics
of hyle. That is to say, hyle is delimited ‘positively, by its belonging
to the reality of the absolute subjectivity, as constitutive of its tis-
sue [étoffe], of its own being; negatively, by the exclusion of every
intentionality out of itself ’42. But for Henry the the vital question
is to extract the fundamental essence of absolute subjectivity from
the material and intentional contents of consciousness. The solu-
tion to this problem appears if one imagines subjectivity as devoid
of its material moments. As Henry discovers, whereas the inten-
tional elements can be abstracted from consciousness without fail-
ing to achieve a grasp of subjective life, the hyletic contents form
exactly the essence of subjectivity. The repercussion of an attempt
to subordinate them to intentional consciousness would mean an
annihilation of subjectivity. The impressional aspect of conscious-
ness determines and grounds intentionality. From this perspective,
Henry argues for the necessity of a new reduction - a reduction that
puts into brackets the intentional activity of the subject in order
to reveal the sole stratum that subsists after the parenthesising, or
putting out of action, of intentionality. Indeed, the noetic acts,
as Henry underlines, do not function without hyle and constitute
nothing without a material ground. From this perspective, the hyl-
etic elements do not represent just a mere ‘blind’ matter which
needs to be in-formed by noetic acts but, on the contrary, impose
their particularity on the constitution of objects. To quote Henry
on this aspect,
42 PM, p. 14.
this determination goes so far that [it is] hyle [that] prescribes
to morphe the essential modalities that it has to take in the con-
stitution of that which it constitutes: perception, imagination,
memory… In this sense, hyle is more essential than morphe for
the determination of an object43.
What is, then, the relation between hyle and intentional con-
sciousness? Is hyle indeed just a material that achieves its fulfilment
by integrating itself functionally within the field of a constituting
intentionality? Are the hyletic moments only mediator elements
that accomplish their role once the sensuous data are transformed
into noematic qualities of real objects? Likewise, is hyle just the
material that is in-formed by intentional, sense bestowing noesis?
To a certain degree, as we have seen in our previous considerations,
Husserl himself suggests that the ‘content/form’ dualism44 is the
one that provides the explicative model for the relation between
hyle and intentional consciousness. As he states, ‘this remarkable
duality and unity of sensuous hyle and intentive morphe plays a
dominant role in the whole phenomenological sphere. In fact these
concepts of stuff and form force themselves upon us’.45 But does
hyle always appear accompanied by the noesis as intentional ‘form’,
43 PM, p. 27.
44 The significant connection between the ‘matter/form’ dualism and time is
highly stressed by Derrida in his Speech and Phenomena (in Speech and Phe-
nomena and Other Essays on Husserl’s Theory of Signs, Evanston, Northwest-
ern University Press, 1973, pp. 3-107), where he affirms that the separation
between eidos and hyle is determined by the dominance of presence in
metaphysics. The criticism is particularly directed against Husserl’s phe-
nomenology and its privileging of the now as form that remains punctual,
i.e. undivided self-presence, through a continuous change of matter. (SP,
p.63). As he declares in his introduction, ‘the opposition between form and
matter – which inaugurates metaphysics – finds in the concrete ideality of
the living present its ultimate and radical justification’. (SP, p. 6).
45 Id I, pp. 204, 172.
similar to Aristotle’s prima matter (prote hyle), or is it possible to

‘receive’ a hyletic datum alone? And what type of experience will
open the way to hyle? : With regard to this aspect, Husserl’s analy-
sis of the time-consciousness flow offers us a clear answer: there
the possibility of receiving an isolated hyletic datum without the
animating apprehensions is rejected. That is, ‘primary contents are
at all times bearers of rays of apprehension, and they do not oc-
cur without such rays, however indeterminate the latter may be’46.
However, further on in the text, in Appendix V, Husserl points
to a new distinction: if hyle is always accompanied by apprehen-
sions, from a temporal perspective these animating acts occur, in
a sense, after the datum of sensation. To the question ‘whether the
apprehension begins simultaneously with the datum of sensation
or whether the datum must not be constituted — even if only for
an extremely brief period of time — before the animating appre-
hension can commence’47, Husserl seems to suggest that the ap-
prehension occurs only at the moment when the datum is elapsing
into retention. Yet, the apprehension relates itself not only to the
actual impressional content, but also to the whole hyletic datum,
including its elapsed phases. Consequently, the hyletic data occur
temporally before apprehensions and exist prior to the animating
acts. But this solution, which is so valuable in imposing a separa-
tion of hyle from intentional consciousness, is, as we have already
discovered, invalidated by the flow of immanent temporality.
Hyle and objectivity

However, another question arises in relation to the sensuous
dimension of consciousness. That is to say, can hyle be an indu-
46 PCIT, pp. 110, 105.
47 PCIT, pp. 115, 110.
bitable evidence for the existence of a particular objective thing,

or is it possible that the same hyletic elements direct to different
objectivities? As Husserl remarks, ‘in the stuffs themselves, by vir-
tue of their own essence, the relation to the Objective unity is not
unambiguously predelineated; the same material complex, instead,
can undergo a diversity of mutually discrete and shifting constru-
ings by virtue of which different objectivities are intended to’48. The
same idea is expressed in No. 49, PCIT49, where Husserl states that
‘it must be noticed that the same primary contents can present some-
thing different, can bring different things to appearance by means
of different thing-apprehensions’50. It seems then that the sensuous
datum cannot secure a strict correspondence in relation to the per-
ceived thing. However, Husserl is ambiguous on this matter since,
a few pages earlier in the text, he suggests the contrary solution.
Commenting on the perception of a tree, he states:
the object, tree, can only appear at all in a perception as Objectively
determined in the mode in which it does appear in the percep-
tion if the hyletic moments (or, in the case of a continuous series
of perceptions, if the continuous hyletic changes) are just those
and no others. This therefore implies that any change of the hyl-
etic content of the perception, if it does not quite do away with
perceptual consciousness, must at least result in what appears be-
coming objectively “other”, whether in itself or in the orientation
in which it is appearing, or the like51.
48 Id I, pp. 242, 206.

49 Cf. DR, where Husserl states: ‘the same complex of contents of sensation
can be the basis of diverse perceptions, perceptions of diverse objects, as
every mannequin proves, inasmuch as here, from a fixed viewpoint, two
perceptions stand in conflict, that of the mannequin as a thing and that of
the presented man, both constructed on the same fundamental sensation’
(pp. 39, 45).
50 PCIT, pp. 334, 322.
51 Id I, pp. 238, 203.
In this way, since the relation between noema and noesis is char-
acterised by parallelism, this ‘essentially mutual correspondence’52
has to be explained by conforming hyle to the real object as intended
by consciousness. It is therefore implied that disruptions and devia-
tions from the corresponding objective moments might be made
possible by the shifting of the animating noetic moments and not by
the hyletic stratum itself. The same hyletic contents can be animated
by different, even conflicting, perceptual apprehensions53.
Hyle and reflection

The question remains whether we can experience the sensuous
datum independently from the animating apprehensions. Though
ambiguous on this issue, which evolves internally from the early to
the later texts, Husserl approaches this position negatively at first,
regarding hyle as mere amorphous and chaotic matter. It is only in
the later texts that a positive answer to the question regarding the
possibility of experiencing hyle alone is envisaged. In this context,
and firmly related to the previous issue, the major question that
emerges in the examination of hyletic phenomenology concerns
the manner in which hyle, the immanent ground of intentional
acts, is given to consciousness. Husserl is aware of this problem
and therefore warns against reflection on the functional matter of
noematic objects. As he notes,
it must be carefully noted that any transition from a phenom-
enon into the reflection which itself is an analysis of the really
52 Id I, pp. 242, 207.

53 For the problematic of overlapping apprehensions with regard to the same hyl-
etic content and their reciprocally inhibiting function, Cf. C. Schües, ‘Con-
flicting apprehensions and the question of sensations’, in Alterity and Facticity
(N. Depraz & D. Zahavi eds., Kluwer, Dordrecht, 1998, pp. 139-62).
inherent, or into the quite differently articulated <reflection>

which dissects its noema, generates new phenomena, and that
we would fail into error were we to confuse the new phenomena
– which, in a certain way, are recastings of the old – with the old
phenomena, and were we to impute to the old what really inher-
ently or noematically is included in the <new>54.
The consequence is that the hyletic moments grasped in reflec-

tion are not the same as those contained in the act of perception
insofar as they are taken as objects. But as immanent moments of
a concrete noetic mental process, are the material contents ever
perceived? Are they given to consciousness in ways other than re-
flection? Levinas answered positively to this question, pointing to a
non-objectifying consciousness. In a like manner, Henry reveals an
original ‘auto-donation’ or ‘auto-impression’ that escapes the modes
of the transcending reflective consciousness55. For Henry, the de-
preciation of hyle in Husserl’s philosophy - especially in Ideas I - is
due to an overstated interest conceded to intentional consciousness.
The metaphor of light as intelligibility dominates Husserl’s texts on
material contents, which, in his view, need to be animated by no-
etic moments and function as ways to access to things themselves.
In light of the intentional analysis, hyletic phenomenology fails to
become an autonomous domain and merely succumbs in front of
the dominating intentional phenomenology. Criticising classical
phenomenology, Henry points out that ‘always already the original
Being of Impression has been broken, split, thrown into a primitive
exteriority’56. To state it differently, Henry rejects the reflective grasp
of hyle, stressing that, in the reflective attitude, dominated by in-
tentionality, hyle can only appear as a content awaiting intentional
54 Id I, pp. 240, 205.

55 PM, p. 28.
56 PM, p. 32.
animating intentions. Intentional consciousness, which follows the

traditional path of a progressive rationalisation, understands hyle
solely as a matter devoid of self-donation. However, the view of
the relation between the hyletic functional matter, passively consti-
tuted, and the intentional form that animates it, has to be reversed.
The donation of intentional consciousness, far from offering insight
into the life of the hyletic subjectivity, is, on the contrary, given to
itself precisely by means of the impressional hyle. In this sense, ma-
terial phenomenology is not subordinated anymore and a pure an-
nex to the analysis of intentional mental processes, but constitutes
phenomenology. Affectivity, the pathos of impression, defines thus
consciousness and precedes intentional directness.
Nonetheless, to use Husserl’s own words, ‘no matter to what
extent these statements contain something right, the conclusions
drawn are still not wholly correct; indeed, the greatest caution is
required in dealing with these difficult questions’57. In this sense,
let us return to Husserl’s texts again to find an answer to the ques-
tion of the givenness of hyle and its relation to reflection. In
Ideas I, Husserl defines reflection as an act but also as a method58.
Generally, reflection is nevertheless ‘a modification of conscious-
ness’59 and a shift from a mode that is unmodified reflectively (if
it is the lowest reflective level) to a reflective seizing upon the ob-
ject of conscious directness. However, in the case of an immanent
datum, Husserl already defines the experiencing of the datum as
reflection60. Though he recognises that impressions are the ulti-
mate and absolutely original ground of reflection, he ambiguously
57 Id I, pp. 242, 207.
58 Id I, pp. 177, 148.
59 Id I, pp. 178, 148.
60 ‘under reflection all modes of seizing upon the essence of something im-
manent and, on the other hand, of experiencing something immanent, are
included’. Id I, pp.178, 148.
operates with two contrasting ideas. In particular, he distinguishes

in §7761, the experiencing of something immanent from the objec-
tifying regard of consciousness, hinting to the idea that this experi-
encing is just a possible substratum of subsequent reflection, while
acknowledging at the same time that experiencing unreflectively an
immanent content is impossible. The matter becomes more com-
plex in the analyses on internal-time consciousness where a more
convincing answer to the question of how hyletic data are accessible
to experience can be found. More precisely, in Appendix IX Husserl
states the dependence of reflection on retention. In this sense, though
retention is not a modification of the impressional data, and, thus,
not a reflection itself, it is retentional consciousness which makes
possible the existence of reflection. In other words, ‘we therefore owe
it to retention that consciousness can be made into an object’62. But
this does not imply that prior to the elapsed phases the contents of
consciousness are ‘unconscious’. As Husserl notices, ‘it is just non-
sense to talk about an “unconscious” content that would only subse-
quently become conscious. Consciousness is necessarily consciousness
in each of its phases’63. In this sense, Husserl emphasises the idea
that retention would not be possible if primal consciousness were
unconscious. At the same time an infinite regress occurs if impres-
sional contents were given to consciousness only through a reflective
grasp. Indeed, ‘if one says that every content comes to consciousness
only by means of an act of apprehension directed towards it, then the
question immediately arises about the consciousness in which this
act of apprehension, which is surely a content itself, becomes con-
scious’64. Thus, hyle is given primary in a manner that is non-reflec-
tive; it is already there, in its own specificity, prior to representation.
61 Id I, pp. 174, 145.
62 PCIT, pp. 123, 119.
63 PCIT, pp. 123, 119.
64 PCIT, pp. 123, 119.
However, a specific uneasiness emerges from the coinciding of hyle

to life, or pure presence. Namely, if singularity is to be defined as self-
coincidence and maximum self-specification, than the intentional
dimension that is revealed within hyle by the genetic approach in the
time lectures, has to be reconsidered. That is to say, the temporality
of hyle has to be either suspended, so that the duality between non-
intentional and intentional elements can be reintroduced as valid, or
the idea of pure self-specification is to be rejected.
4. Hyle: between pure presence and temporal difference

An ec-static impression (M. Henry)
It is exactly, as we pointed out earlier, the modification of impres-
sion from from the now-mode to retentional consciousness which is
considered by Henry, in relation to Husserlian phenomenology of
time-consciousness, to be a failure to seize impression in its original
dimension. The continuous contamination of the primal impres-
sion by retentional modifications means that it is impossible to
locate a fixed point in time, a punctual moment, which would not
extend temporally to the horizon surrounding each phase of the
temporal flow. There is not a real now-point in Husserl’s philoso-
phy, but only ideal and artificially imposed cuts65. Indeed, Husserl
himself states at the beginning of his analyses on time-consciousness
that ‘the now is precisely only an ideal limit, something abstract,
65 Here, we have to note that the infinite partition of retentions into discrete
moments is a theoretical construct because there is no phenomenological
ground that could suggest that retention, or the now-phase, divides itself
into infinitesimal moments that retain or protend differently ad infinitum.
In this sense, Husserl incorrectly takes a theoretical restriction for a phe-
nomenological datum.
which can be nothing by itself ’66. By sinking down into the past,
continuity integrates each phase into a flowing unity and
if in some way we divide this continuum into two adjoining parts,
then the part that includes the now or is capable of constituting
it is distinguished from the other part and constitutes the “rough”
now; as soon as we divide this rough now further, it in turn imme-
diately breaks down into finer now and a past, and so on67.
As a result, primal impression is a duration block devoid of an

original self-coincidence that could define it. The intentional open-
ness of the present is, for Henry, the origin of the alteration of the
impression from its self-presence to the non-being of the ‘just-having-
been’ of retentional consciousness68. The impressional consciousness
of the now-phase is ceaselessly united to retentional modes and, from
this perspective, impression is a continuous self-privation that awaits
for a complete auto-donation with the advent of retentions. Husserl
introduces thus an implicit domination of the now-mode by reten-
tion, which, paradoxically, plays the role of an original consciousness
that evicts the fullness of the present. But Henry takes the argument a
step further, observingthat, by positing retention as radical conscious-
ness, Husserl falls prey to inconsistency. The reason is that, by assign-
ing prevalence to retention,the flow itself splits into a multitude of
non-homogenous modes. In order to secure the continuity of indi-
vidualised points flowing away, the stream needs new phases of actu-
ality. Hence Husserl attempts to free the now-point by accentuating
its intricate and close bound to the existence of the flow. Nonetheless,
Husserl never positively solves the question of the auto-donation of
impression but merely succumbs to contradictory and obscure draft-
ing solutions without grasping the insight of impressional conscious-
66 PCIT, pp. 42, 40.
67 PCIT, pp. 42, 40.
ness. As Henry states, it is not impression that needs the now-mode

of consciousness in order to be given to itself. On the contrary, the
tripartite form of the flow develops precisely out of impressional con-
tents. There is therefore a double dismissal of impression in Husserl’s
philosophy69. The first one occurs with the interpretation of hyle as
material content awaiting animating intentional forms to be included
in the constitution of transcendent objects; the second one – by re-
placing the original self-donation of impression with an ec-static tem-
poral givenness of itself through the structure of primal impression-
retention-protention. Continuously degrading impression70, Husserl
falls short to apprehend subjectivity in its essence as life. If impression
is pure subjectivity and primordial donation, then Husserl mistakenly
overlooks this original consciousness by introducing permanent alien-
ating elements. Henry opposes this division of impression underlin-
ing its absolute and non-reflective self-affection where no distance can
ever be interposed. Moreover, impression never changes since ‘that
which never changes, that which never breaks, it is that which makes
it an impression, it is in it the essence of life’71. Subjectivity is thus im-
pression, self-donation that remains unchanged through the advent
of every new actual phase. That which is life itself cannot be expli-
cated, as Husserl does, by means of intentional consciousness and ob-
jectivity. By referring to the other, through retention and protention,
impressional consciousness cannot expose, in Husserl’s analyses, the
veritable nature of subjectivity.
Against pure presence (J. Derrida)

An essential counter-reading is revealed by Derrida in his endea-
vour to bring to light the metaphysical presuppositions of Husserl’s
69 PM, p. 49.
70 Cf. Henry, I, First Part, esp. §7 and § 8, pp. 65-81.
71 PM, p. 54.
phenomenology. Based on their incongruity, these two counter-

interpretations will subsequently be linked to the impossibility of
a hyletic singularity. If for Henry the privileging of retention un-
dermines the purity of the Living Present and of auto-affection, for
Derrida only a constant and original interplay with alterity, in the
form of temporality, can secure the validity of Husserl’s philosophy
of time-consciousness. Indeed, Derrida regards phenomenology as
a critique of metaphysics, which returns and participates in the
project that it attempts to reject and exceed. As he states in Speech
and Phenomena, ‘Husserl, while ceaselessly criticising metaphysical
speculation, in fact had his eye on only the perversion or degeneracy
of what he continued to believe in and wished to restore as authen-
tic metaphysics’72. On this account, Derrida stresses the idea that
phenomenology is the highest metaphysical project in the history
of philosophy in the sense that, situating itself at the limits of the
ontological discourse, phenomenology confirms and explores the
exemplarity of metaphysics. Phenomenology is therefore just the
achievement, in its highest form, of metaphysical assumptions.
Introducing the French translation of Husserl’s short essay73
on the origin and tradition of geometrical ideal objects, Derrida
comments on the phenomenological ground of the text. Inquiring
into the history of geometrical ideality, Husserl unveils in fact a
consideration of the history of science and, through it, of universal
history. Transmitted by way of a continuous traditional sedimenta-
tion, ideal objects have historicity and, insofar as the Living Present
is the origin of temporal alteration, the becoming of their sense is
similar to the way temporality functions. That is the main reason why
Derrida examines not only questions related to the role of language,
linguistic community, ideality, but also aspects correlated to the his-
72 SP, p. 5.
73 L’origine de la géométrie, Paris, PUF, 1974 (1st ed. 1962)..
toric present. In this context, Derrida emphasises the ambiguity of

the Husserlian thinking, which privileges ‘the absolutely unique and
universal form of the Living Present’74 while revealing the intricate
structure of retention and protention. As Derrida points out, the
Living Present, ‘which is the primordial absolute of temporality, is
only the maintenance of what indeed must be called the dialectic
of protention and retention, despiteHusserl’s repugnance for that
word’75. The same idea is reinforced once more towards the end of
the introduction, when Derrida discerns a certain dominance of the
Now in the model of the temporal phenomenological movement.
The Living Present, which is ‘the phenomenological absolute’, ‘has
the irreducible originality of a Now, the ground of a Here’, but only
in relation to retention76. It is however the present as such that re-
mains the origin of retention, which is a ‘past Now’, ‘an original proj-
ect’ itself77. In this sense, protention is in turn not only ‘a next Now’,
but a confirmation of the privileging of the present constituting the
horizon of the temporal flow. This permanent hesitation between
the potential unveiling of the ‘primordial Difference of the absolute
Origin’78 and the confirmed pre-eminence of presence, captures the
74 OG, pp.58, 46. Cf. Marion’s critique (in God Without Being, Chicago,
University of Chicago Press, 1991, p.169ff) of the ‘ordinary conception of
time’, which considers temporality as starting from the privileged moment
of the present, of the ‘here and now’. To this metaphysical temporality,
Marion opposes the ‘Christic’ one, or the ‘temporality of the gift’, which
temporises the present only through the distance that the memorial past
and the eschatological future open. This ‘inter-space’ makes possible the
present, or the ‘gift of presence’. However, Marion’s criticism, while attack-
ing indirectly Husserl’s phenomenology of time, operates with a model that
still privileges presence and the inter-space that past and future create.
75 OG, pp. 58, 46.
76 OG, pp. 136, 149.
77 OG, pp. 137, 149.
78 OG, pp. 153, 171.
originality and, at the same time, the failure of Husserl’s analyses of

time-consciousness. Referring unceasingly to retention and proten-
tion, ‘the Absolute of the Living Present, then, is only the indefinite
Maintenance [the Nowness] of this double enveloping’79. On the
basis of these remarks, Derrida’s final paragraph stresses the danger of
maintaining the purity of the present, ‘the impossibility of resting in
the simple maintenance [nowness] of a Living Present’80. The pleni-
tude and self-identity of the origin has to be replaced by Difference
and alterity. As Derrida underlines, ‘the inability to live enclosed in
the innocent undividedness [indivision] of the primordial Absolute,
because the Absolute is present only in being deffered-delayed [dif-
férant] without respite, this impotence and this impossibility are
given in a primordial and pure consciousness of Difference’81.
It is, however, in Speech and Phenomena that Derrida discloses,
by means of a remarkable argumentative discourse, the presupposi-
tions that ground phenomenology. The entire argument is based
on a critique of the Husserlian idea that meaning precedes public
context, or human linguistic communities, and is formed origi-
nally in a sphere of purity that excludes any external reference or
indicative dimension. But, as Derrida argues, this indirect privileg-
ing of presence, which confirms the adherence of phenomenology
to classical ontology, is ruled out by the necessary contamination of
expressive signs by indicative elements. It is, however, in Husserl’s
analyses on time-consciousness that Derrida locates the prospect
of reviving philosophically the dogmatic assumption of a full and
original givenness in the form of presence. As he states in his in-
troduction, ‘phenomenology seems to us tormented, if not con-
tested from within, by its own descriptions of the movement of
79 OG, pp. 137, 149.
80 OG, pp. 153, 171.
81 OG, pp. 153, 171.
temporalisation’82. In an attempt to formulate the problems posed

by the metaphysical residues present in Husserl’s texts, Derrida
begins with an interrogation that represents, at the same time, an
invitation to reconsider critically the whole of the Husserlian ac-
count. To quote Derrida, ‘do not phenomenological necessity, the
rigor and subtlety of Husserl’s analysis, the exigencies to which
it responds and which we must recognise, nonetheless conceal a
metaphysical presupposition?’83. Derrida’s argument is then just an
effort to bring to light the insights of this commitment to presence
that Husserl’s concept of sign exposes.
Husserl’s distinction in Logical Investigations between two differ-
ent meanings of the term ‘sign’ (Zeichen), i.e. expression (Ausdruck)
and indication (Anzeichen), is rooted in the privileging of the first
one as revealing the veritable nature of language, which is based,
in turn, on a primordial pre-expressive sense-stratum84. It is in-
deed the originally silent dimension of expressive signs that Husserl
plays against ‘the sonorous substance’ or ‘the body of speech in the
world’85. If expression and indication have interconnected signify-
ing relations in the spoken language (Rede), that is to say, they con-
tinuously contaminate each other, it is solely in the ‘solitary mental
life’ that the expressive purity of meaning can be revealed. In the
monologue and in the absence of any communication, expression
is independent of any indicative or extrinsic process. The expres-
sive discourse, however, is characterised by another specificity: it
expresses, by means of the voice, an ideal object. The language is
82 SP, p. 6.
83 SP, p 4.
84 Expression, revealed in the solitary life, is just a ‘medium’ that brings sense,
which is pre-liguistic and pre-expressive, into the universal form of ideality.
This sense is complete self-identity and self-presence.
85 SP, p. 16.
then defined in relation to ideality and, from this perspective, as

Derrida shows, ‘the ideal transparency and perfect univocity’86 is
Husserl’s categorical model for language. Furthermore, ideality is
at the same time the infinite potential repetition in the form of a
continuous reinforcement of presence.
Through soliloquy, Derrida highlights a dimension of self-
presence insofar as the exclusion of all contexts of communication
brings forth the eradication of the entire ‘mundane register’87. In
this sense, as Derrida observes, ‘the phenomenological voice would
be this spiritual flesh that continues to speak and be present to
itself – to hear itself- in the absence of the world’88. The presence
of other persons is also eliminated because factual speech is based
on analogical appresentation and on the impossibility of a primor-
dial access to the other’s private experiences. It is the privileging of
presence as consciousness or immediate self-presence that Derrida
criticises in the distinction between indication and expression be-
cause the ground for this distinction is, in fact, the opposition be-
tween self-presence and non-self-presence. That is the reason why
the expressive monadic sphere requires the rejection of the other
outside the pure immediate presence of consciousness. It is, indeed,
in this sense that Derrida considers that the constitution of the in-
tersubjective relations in the Fifth Cartesian Meditations invalidates
Husserl’s distinction between expression and indication.
Another important aspect of this distinction is based on the
idea that interior monologue does not use real words, but only
imaginary ones. Imaginary representation, which appears in the re-
duction to the inward speech and the suspension of the mundane,
offers Derrida one of the main critical assessments of the distinc-
86 SP, p. 52.
87 SP, p. 35.
88 SP, p. 16.
tion between indication and expression. The point is that the dif-
ference between effective communication and ‘represented’ speech
is blurred once one recognises the fact that the sign is by definition
representative and potentially repetitive. As Derrida points out, ‘I
cannot enter into an “effective” discourse without being from the
start involved in unlimited representation’89. Moreover, presence
itself is permanently corrupted by representation. On this ground,
Derrida reverses the tendency in the history of metaphysics to
consider signs derivative in relation to presence. Derrida attempts
to demonstrate that representation is, on the contrary, the essen-
tial dimension that defines signs’ existence and identity. In other
words, ‘the presence-of-the-present is derived from repetition and
not the reverse’90. Thus, if there is no valid criterion to separate
inner monologue from actual communication, the fictitious from
the effective, and the ideal from the real, Husserl’s endeavour to
demonstrate the possibility of isolating a purely expressive realm
is unconvincing and groundless. However, Derrida’s idea that self-
presence is mediated by representation and his rejection of a pre-
linguistic immediacy need to be critically assessed.
Derrida highlights the dependence of signification on tempo-
rality as another major point which can reverse Husserl’s commit-
ment to the metaphysical tradition. A temporality of non-presence
and difference is potential in Husserl’s thinking and posits itself
against his valuation of presence. Once again, Derrida’s interpreta-
tive schema, i.e. ‘working over the language of metaphysics from
within’91, is applied in order to bring to light the paradoxical and
contradictory aspects of Husserl’s phenomenological project. The
ideal of self-presence presupposes the ‘undivided unity of a tempo-
89 SP, p. 50.
90 SP, p. 52.
91 SP, p. 51.
ral present’92, the instantaneous reality of the now, or the punctual-

ity of a discrete present. But, to quote Derrida, if the punctuality
of the instant is a myth, a spatial or mechanical metaphor, an in-
herited metaphysical concept, or all that at once, and if the present
and self-presence is not simple, if it is constituted in a primordial
and irreducible synthesis, then the whole of Husserl’s argumenta-
tion is threatened in its very principle93.
In his analyses on time-consciousness, Husserl rejects the hy-
pothesis of a punctual now that can exist isolated or be separat-
ed from retention and protention. It is, indeed, at this level that
Husserl undermines his strict distinction between an expressive
and an indicative speech by weakening the self-identity of the pres-
ent. However, despite the complexity of temporal structures, the
now is still caught, to a certain extent, in the traditional privileging
of presence insofar as Husserl regards it as the ‘source-point’ or the
‘absolute beginning’ of the modes of temporal becoming. Even the
separation between the now and retention, as described by Husserl,
is for Derrida nullified once one underlines the continuity that
unites them on the basis of their impressional nature. In this sense,
the difference between the impressional now and retention has to
be integrated into a more primitive movement to otherness that in-
troduces a radical distinction between these two modes of appear-
ing. While Husserl contrasts the now to retention, Derrida regards
the explanation of this opposition as secondary and defective. But
is not Derrida, at this point of the discussion, merely forcing his
own interpretative ideas upon an otherwise positive contribution
and extremely complex argument? It seems indeed that Derrida’s
account becomes here contradictory and prey to unsolved problems
insofar at it oscillates between accepting an imperative continuity
92 SP, p. 60.
93 SP, p. 61.
between primal impression and retention, and stressing the differ-

ence which exists between the two. Derrida goes even further by
exposing the difference between re-presentation and presentative
perception, which characterises the distinction between retention
and recollection, the re-produced now and the retained now, as a
problematic one. For Derrida, the contrast between primary and
secondary memory is not to be defined in terms of an opposition
between the perceptive and the non-perceptive, because the separa-
tion of the two is only given by modifications within non-presence.
This is explained by the impossibility to have a non-repetitive mo-
ment. Retention, similar to recollection, is repetitive and initiated
by the trace, which ‘is always older than presence and procures for
it its openness’94. Without any absolute inside, a new dimension
of auto-affection, which is precisely openness towards the outside,
can be defined. Primordial fissure of presence, its infinite deferral,
announces the death of the metaphysics of presence.
5. The aporetic singularity of hyle

Hyle: immanence, or difference?
After presenting two remarkable textual appropriations of
Husserl’s account, it is of great importance to contrast Henry’s
critique, which focuses on Husserl’s failure to maintain the pu-
rity and absolute immanence of hyle, devoid of duplication, with
Derrida’s claim that difference constitutes the primitive ground of
consciousness. If for Henry retentional consciousness is the pri-
mordial aspect that dismisses pure presence, revoking, as a result,
the value of Husserl’s phenomenological account, for Derrida, it is
precisely the inability to separate enough the now from retention,
94 SP, p. 68.
and maintain the idea that non-presence is internal to presence,

that condemns Husserl’s texts. In this context, it is interesting to
oppose Derrida’s claim that, in a negative way, ‘temporality has a
non-displaceable centre, an eye or living core, the punctuality of
the real now’95, to Henry’s discontented and equally dissatisfied
remark that in Husserl’s phenomenology ‘there is no fixed point,
nothing that escapes the flowing, [and] in consequence, no veritable
now’96. What is it that makes possible to interpret the same text,
in totally contrastive terms and through equally meticulous and
rigorous arguments? Are both arguments simple overreactions and
unsatisfactory commentaries? To what extent do they unfold latent
developments of the text itself?
To start with, Derrida’s reading is surely remarkably original, il-
luminating in great details the imprecise or even non-accurate mo-
ments of Husserl’s thought but, one of its most problematic aspects
is the impossibility (or, from a deconstructivist perspective, the un-
decidedness) to distinguish the passage from a critical assessment to
a philosophical agreement. Derrida plays with this indecision and
infiltrates, at each stage of his argument, a reading that deconstructs
the original text and subordinates it to a new reading scheme, i.e.
the difference between the same and the other. Derrida’s treatment
is, then, sometimes impetuous and extreme in the sense that, while
acknowledging the potential double reading of Husserl’s thought,
it assumes illegitimately the validity of only one of them97. With re-
gard to Henry’s criticism, Husserl offers a potential development and
95 SP, p. 62.
96 PM, p. 37.
97 For a critical approach to Derrida’s reading of Husserl, Cf. also D. Wood,
The Deconstruction of Time (New York, Humanities Press International,
1989), esp. pp. 111-133; J. J. Brough, ‘Husserl and the Deconstruction of
Time’ (Review of Metaphysics 46, 1993, pp. 503-536).
answer to it in No. 51 of his texts on time-consciousness. Husserl

underlines there the idea that to restrict phenomenological validity
to actual present phenomena means to open the path to ‘absolute
scepticism’98 since there is nothing that could refrain us from doubt-
ing even further the certainty of the now-moment. Indeed, whenever
we grasp a now-moment as absolute givenness, we reconstruct it and
hence generate a new now-point. Consequently, our phenomeno-
logical analyses show that duration is an absolute evidence and that
‘the restriction to the now, which is in continuous flux, would be a
fiction’99. The flow renders possible the privileged dimension of the
now-moment, which Husserl acknowledges insofar as it constitutes a
source-point, but absolute presence is formed through duration and
is contaminated by non-presence. Therefore, as Husserl emphasises
it, to the question ‘should we...say that only the absolute now is some-
thing actually given and free from the problem of transcendence, and
that even the least extension into the past –which surely belongs to
duration- is problematic?’ we have to answer negatively100. Indeed,
to follow Husserl’s argument further, the radical scepticism that the
limitation to the present moment produces ends the ‘flow of con-
sciousness’ and, at the same time, makes impossible the very pos-
sibility of discourse. Thus, ‘the absolute now nowhere seems capable
of being apprehended when we attempt, in abstraction, to leave the
flow out of consideration or even to question it’101.
The singularity of hyle

The problem concerning temporality is more intricate, as it af-
fects the manner in which the paradoxical nature of hyle is to be
conceived. Between pure immanence, and continuous difference,
98 PCIT, pp. 352-55, 341-44.
99 PCIT, pp. 354, 343.
100 PCIT, pp. 361, 350.
101 PCIT, pp. 361, 350.
the temporal becoming of the sense-data conceals the inconsisten-

cies present in Husserl’s account. Indeed, hyletic singularity, under-
stood in the sense of a non-synthetic specification, is characterised
by its simplicity and its merely presentive nature. Hyle is a non-
compounded datum, the simplest singular, and the one that eludes
most the distance between a reflective regard on life, and the affec-
tion of living experience. It is this transparency that Henry attempts
to save in his account of hyletic phenomenology. If sensuousness
is to form the maximum type of proximity to the non-active focus
on life, then specification has to concentrate its non-mediated di-
mension into an inherent implosion of the present. Therefore, hyle
cannot be temporal, i.e. it cannot evade the instant and become ge-
neric. But Husserl’s analyses on time-consciousness reveal precisely
the problematic aspect of this account. Temporal phases as appre-
hensions of the same content generate an infinite regression since
every temporal object presupposes a sensuous element. Likewise,
the absolute temporal flow of consciousness itself requires that the
‘constant form is always filled anew by “content”, but the content
is certainly not something introduced into the form from without.
On the contrary, it is determined through the form of regularity-
only in such a way that this regularity does not alone determine the
concretum’102. Consequently, temporality functions on the basis of
sense-contents. But if the hyletic datum itself is to be accepted as
temporal, it implies that another sensuous content has to render
possible the temporal apprehension of the former one. In this case,
though, the second hyletic element, which is also temporal, has
to be given as temporal only by being grounded on a third hyletic
datum. This infinite regression generates, in fact, an impossibil-
ity to conceive the hyletic stratum in temporal terms, because the
moment of receding into a past phase would be forever delayed.
102 PCIT, pp. 118, 114.
Thus, hyle cannot possibly be included into the immanent flow of

temporal objects. In this sense, as Henry strives to prove, hyle has
to be pure self-consciousness and absolute immanence.
Nevertheless, another dilemma arises once we accept the non-
temporality of the hyletic data. It is the questionable nature of this
proposition that Derrida contests, as the absolute presence of the
hyletic datum reveals itself to be artificially imposed and unnatural,
a mere legacy of the traditional celebration of presence. In con-
trast to the fascination with pure immanence, Derrida shows that
temporality is the ultimate inadequacy of this position. There is a
generic dimension even within the sensuousness of consciousness,
and pure actuality cannot be anything else than a myth.
The problem of temporality exposes the ‘lowest level’ of con-
stitution since, as Husserl remarks, ‘the operations of the synthesis
in internal time-consciousness’ are presupposed by all subsequent
constitutive syntheses103. In this perspective, we can affirm that
even the elementary level of the hyletic data is synthetic, since it
presupposes temporal syntheses. It is, hence, true that hyle is not
non-compounded, but is already a synthetic unity that determines
itself in temporal variations. The discrete contents of hyletic con-
stitution are, thus, abstractly constructed, divided into sequential
moments in reflection. In reality, the non-temporal nature of hyle
would make impossible a phenomenological investigation of the
sense-data. That is to say, pure presence is, indeed, as Husserl ob-
served, aporetic: the ability to doubt it, or to talk about it, is exclud-
ed. It is only through temporality that hyle can have a phenomeno-
logical meaning at all, but, in the synthetic aspect of its temporal
givenness, sensuousness sacrifices its receptivity by integrating into
itself the intentional reference of apprehensions. Additionally, hyle
cannot be accepted as singular in the sense defined at the outset
103 EJ, § 16, p. 73.
of this examination. The reason is that sense-data are a paradoxi-

cal creation in phenomenology: they are either over-specified and
generate problematic consequences as to their pure immanence;
or they are underdetermined and risk to lose their quality as a first
ground of synthetic activity.
To sum up, if hyle is a pure presenting content, it has to be
animated by apprehension. Non-intentional in its own nature, the
sense-datum demands the mediation of the intentional in order
to become concrete. As Adorno rightly observes, ‘the concept of
sensation becomes nugatory as soon as sensation is supposed to
have a content, i.e. in some sense “means” something, and yet it is
defined as hyle, as absolute content’104. If, however, hyle is to open
itself to temporal genesis, it becomes necessary that the distinction
between non-intentional and intentional constituents be erased.
Thus, sensuousness becomes inhabited by intentional reference,
gaining a concrete connection to intended reality, but abandon-
ing its role as a first, non-mediated, datum. Going back to Sartre’s
remark, we can assert that hyle is an ambiguous and highly para-
doxical concept in Husserl’s phenomenology, insofar as it oscillates
between the prevalence of a non-compounded singular, and the
role of a secondary datum. In this respect, the phenomenological
immediacy is already mediated, striving to conform to the things
themselves only to discover that bridging the distance cannot be
performed, but is merely operative in the effort itself.
The indecision presented in Husserl’s writings with regard to
the simplest singularity implies that a non-synthetic datum is dif-
ficult to be evoked from a strict phenomenological perspective. As
we have argued, between pure presence and radical difference, the
hyle cannot secure both its inner coherence and its phenomenolog-
ical status. In the inability to approach the ultimate basis of every
constitution, the singular has to be abandoned: there is no hyletic
104 T. Adorno, op. cit., p. 151.
singularity. The original dimension of a phenomenological consti-

tution is always retracting from the focus of a reflective grasp. But if
the singularity of an ultimate origin is an operative myth insofar as
Husserl’s phenomenology is concerned, is it not particularity that
has to be regarded as singular?
The next chapter will account for the intermediary passage in
the hierarchy of parts and wholes105 in an attempt to present sin-
105 In Ideas I Husserl introduces the idea of singular essences, employing the
same hierarchic model that we have used so far to characterise synthetic
objectivities. Husserl parallels this eidetic hierarchy to the part and whole
distinction, which is described as a relation between ‘that which contains
and that which is contained’ (pp. 25, 26). In accordance, the eidetic singu-
larity [eidetisch Singulare] is said to be the maximum degree of specification,
which is closest to factual particularisations. In the hierarchy of essences,
the highest genus is formed by the highest generality, whereas infimae species
constitute the ultimate basis of the ascending to more universal essences.
The question that arises is whether we have to take into account an inquiry
into singular eidetic formations. The solution to this issue lies on the relation
that essences have with matters of fact, because if singular essences depend
on factual singularities (individuals as they are described in the next chapter
of this book), then their dependence involve a synthetic and comparative
activity. Husserl tends to assert the idea that eidetic variation is not rooted
in actual singularities, but fundamentally embraces imaginative variations.
However, he asserts that ‘to each essence there correspond possible indi-
vidua which would be its factual singularisations’ (Id I, pp. 16, 16 ). Thus, if
an empirical comparison is not sufficient for the acquisition of essences, the
imaginative objectivity that is the basis of the modifications implied in the
foundation of essences still constitutes the model of an eidetic singularity.
But the free variations produced through imagination are dependent on
a prior familiarity with factual existence. Moreover, as Husserl stresses in
Experience and Judgement, essences are synthetic insofar as it is clear that
‘a unity runs through this multiplicity of successive figures, that in such
free variations of an original image, e.g., of a thing, an invariant is neces-
sarily retained’ (p. 341). Thus, even if based on imagination, the essence
is established as commonality of variants. To accentuate this idea, let us
quote Husserl again: ‘the eidos depends on a freely and arbitrarily producible
multiplicity of variants attaining coincidence’ (p. 342). In this sense, singu-
lar essences are themselves formed through syntheses of communality, and
gularity as a unique cluster of characteristics.But before we embark

on these analyses, let us recall that syntheses are the major obstacle
in the formation of the singular. In the next chapter, we will look
at whether particulars are synthetic. Do they present a communal
type of identity? The answer seems to be affirmative, but we cannot
decide on this matter before an in-depth examination.
imaginative variations do not necessitate a separate discussion from the one

referring to actual syntheses, but can be comprehended through the model
constructed for factual objectivities. For a more detailed examination, see
EJ, §87 about essential seeing, especially the section on congruence and dif-
ference in the formation of essences (pp. 346-347), where Husserl states that
differences between variants always presuppose a unitary coincidence.
CHAPTER III
THE MANIFOLD-UNITARY SINGULARS,

OR SINGULARITY AS PARTICULARITY
In Difference and Repetition Deleuze argues in favour of a sin-

gularity that is opposed to the particular, in the same way in which
repetition is to be distinguished from generality. The relation be-
tween singularity and repetition seems to be all the more problem-
atic if one does not follow Deleuze in his delimitation of repetition
as disguise and displacement that can only refer to pre-individual
singularities. Despite the failure that Deleuze unveils with regard
to the assimilation of the singular to particularity, this chapter will
incorporate a discussion of this alternative before deciding on its
heuristic value. In conformity with the common parlance, singu-
larity is a unique configuration of characteristics that refuses repeti-
tion. If the phenomenological presentation of the hyletic data has
proved to engender a series of inconsistent claims as far as singular-
ity is concerned, it is our purpose to refer, in this chapter, to the
next step in the hierarchy of parts and wholes. Our leading clue in
the investigation of singularity as particularity is the assumption
that guides general discussions on this topic. Indeed, we often hear
that each one of us is singular, and that objects within our sphere
of experience are also unique as to their connection to our own
home-worlds. Thus, experienced unities, such as individuals and
objects, can be valid candidates for a phenomenology of singu-
larity. However, one can reply that, before we reach independent
clusters of characteristics, we have to take into account their parts,
which can also be singular. A discussion of their components will
be included in this chapter as to cover a regressive approach to con-
stitution. The distance between hyle and manifold-unities will be

prospected by means of a phenomenological consideration of the
constitutive basis of particulars.
The exploration of singularity as particularity will be divided
into two main parts. The first one will refer to transcendental in-
dividuals and to the way in which the problem of the individua-
tion of the ego is to be constructed in accordance with Husserl’s
phenomenology; the second part will discuss transcendent objects
and the issue of thing-constitution. The question that directs our
research is the following one: is particularity a form of singular-
ity? In this perspective, two aspects have to be considered: namely,
what makes a particular individual, or object a unique one; and do
particulars escape the challenge of synthetic communality?
1.The singularity of the transcendental

a.Transcendental / empirical individuation
Is the transcendental individuated?
The pure ego, or pure consciousness, is the ultimate basis of a
phenomenological investigation. Through the reductive move, the
transcendental subject brackets the empirical ego, which, as tran-
scendent, belongs to a natural realm. Thus, with the exclusion of all
worldly entities, consciousness is posited against the psychophysi-
cal processes that define an individual subject in the context of a
natural life-world. Indeed, the immanent being of pure conscious-
ness is absolute and independent in its existence from the world of
transcendent things, including its empirical equivalent: the human
ego. In this sense, we can assert that, for Husserl, the empirical ego
has to be considered, in the light of a phenomenological research,
as an intentional correlate of pure consciousness. But, since pure
THE MANIFOLD-UNITARY SINGULARS 95
consciousness is only intentionally related to everything transcen-

dent, the question that arises, within a transcendental project, is
how to extract the absolute ego from an abstract lack of individual-
ity? Or, in other words, how is it possible to preserve individuality
at a transcendental dimension of inquiry, without fusing individu-
als into a neutral term ( the transcendental ego)? This problem be-
comes acute when we read, in Crisis, that ‘the “I” that I attain in
the epoché … is actually called “I” only by equivocation’1. In this
sense, if the result of the epoché is not an I, then the community
of transcendental egos, which constitutes the world as an objec-
tive, intentional horizon, has to be rejected on the basis of a lack of
individuation. Or, to be more precise, the transcendental intersub-
jectivity has to be envisaged as nothing more than a collection of
identical, or cognate, ‘egos’, which does not form a differentiated
community, but only a multiplication of the same. It is in line
with the previous observation that Levinas stresses the idea that ‘a
reason cannot be other for a reason’, asking rightfully the following
question: ‘how can a reason be an I or an other, since its very being
consists in renouncing singularity?’2. Therefore, the community of
pure egos, far from bringing forth an example of intersubjective
relations, suggests, on the contrary, the presence of a universalised
ego. Subjectivity degenerates then, from a first person perspective,
into a third person neutral identity, which renders differences un-
intelligible, or purely rhetorical. To quote Schutz on this matter,
we can ask ‘is it conceivable and meaningful to speak of a plu-
rality of transcendental egos? Is not the concept of the transcen-
dental ego conceivable only in the singular…a singulare tantum?’3.
1 C, p. 184, §54b.
2 Levinas, TI, p. 72.
3 A. Schutz, ‘The Problem of Transcendental Intersubjectivity in Husserl’, Col-
lected Papers III (The Hague, Martinus Nijhoff, 1966), p. 83. To strengthen
Interestingly connected to this opinion is the critical remark that

Heidegger raises in relation to the problem of individuation. Failing
to account for the being of the transcendental ego, Husserl is, ac-
cording to this interpretation, unable to respond to the challenge
of individuation. Heidegger explains this tendency by underlining
the reflective nature of Husserl’s formative phenomenology, which
is oriented towards generic universals rather than individualities.
Overlooking the factually living human being, the reduction ‘disre-
gards not only reality but also any particular individuation of lived
experiences. It disregards the fact that the acts are mine, or those of
any other individual human being’4. As a result, Heidegger impos-
es the need for phenomenology to go back to the suspended being
and the question of being. However, this project of returning to the
factual being of the ego will not be considered here since it evokes
complex issues that deviate from the course of our argument. The
question that it raises is, nonetheless, considerable: in what sense is
the transcendental susceptible of individuation?
The identity of the transcendental/mundane ego

Another problem, closely connected to the previous one, refers
to the relation of the transcendental ego to the personal one. If the
problem of individuation can be solved only at an empirical level of
investigation, then how is it still possible to connect the two egos:
the transcendental and the mundane one?5 Furthermore, on what
this point, one can also refer to Husserl’s own remark (Cf. D. Cairns, Con-
versations with Husserls and Fink, p. 59), that without an apperception of
oneself as a psychic subject, ‘the transcendental ego (…) is not a subject, but
sui generis “the” subject’.
4 M. Heidegger, History of the Concept of Time, p. 109.
5 For Fink, (Studien zur Phänomenologie 1930-1939, The Hague, M. Nijhoff,
1966, trans. by D. Franck, De la phénoménologie, Paris, Éds. de Minuit, 1974)
basis is the transcendental consciousness still to be determined as

an ego? Indeed, the personal ego – the one that gives real meaning
to individuality as such -, cannot be accepted within a phenomeno-
logical approach that determines itself as eidetic. Hence, the pole
of individuation, as Sartre suggests in the Transcendence of the Ego,
has to be entirely abandoned when we step into a transcendental
field of investigation. There is nothing else than a false labelling of
an abstract community, which is in reality a tautological elimina-
tion of the subject. But the confusion on this matter increases with
assertions like the following one: phenomenology is ‘nothing more
than a consequentially executed self-explication in the form of a
systematic egological science, an explication of my ego as subject of
every possible cognition’6. As egological, the transcendental reflec-
tion seems to do justice to the subjective nature of every individual.
However, through the reduction, my ego is to become an eidos, a
universal pole that is based on invariant cognitive forms. Finding
a middle ground between a de facto individual subjectivity, and an
eidetic self seems to be rather unlikely.
As we have stated before, transcendental consciousness ex-
cludes, by means of the epoché, everything transcendent, the
this issue generates logical aporias and is related to the third paradox that un-
derlines a phenomenological investigation, namely the logical paradox of tran-
scendental determinations (Cf. ‘La philosophie phénoménologique d’Edmund
Husserl face à la critique contemporaine’, De la phénoménologie, pp. 95-175).
As an example, Fink mentions the question of how to determine the identity
of the transcendental ego and of the human ego. Thus, ‘is-there simply one
ego under two different perspectives, or two egos separated?’ (p.175). One can-
not employ here the identity-in-difference that characterises ontic forms of
identity because it is purely a constitutive type of identity that can explain
how a transcendental and a mundane being are the same. Nevertheless, the
solution is paradoxical and leaves open the question of distinguishing between
a transcendent and a transcendental mode of identity.
6 CM, pp. 86, 118.
whole psychophysical world. The empirical ego, being part of this

world, is to be nullified together with all natural living and con-
crete experiences. Nonetheless, as Husserl asserts in Ideas I, ‘that
which in itself is absolute can relinquish its immanence and take
on the characteristic of transcendence’7. The explanation of this
paradoxical inversion of the methodologically reduced ego is deter-
mined by ego’s participation in the world, which the existence of
an organism imposes. Yet, the corporeal part of an ego, which ap-
pears as intermingled with the immanent consciousness, does not
alter the essence of consciousness. The real, empirical ego-subject,
or the animate ego with its individual characteristics, is still tran-
scendent, accidental and merely relative in relation to the absolute,
and necessary consciousness. It is, thus, not surprising to conclude
that ‘certainly, a consciousness without an animated organism and,
paradoxical as it sounds, also without a psyche, a consciousness
which is not personal, is imaginable’8.
In this perspective, the transcendental ego is, once more, de-
fined as a non-personal consciousness. With this remark, not only
the problematic of a transcendental intersubjectivity, but also the
possibility of conceiving subjectivity as personal self-determination
and individual existence, seem to be forever lost. As Husserl ob-
serves with regard to the transcendental tradition, ‘the difference
between empirical and transcendental subjectivity [remains] un-
avoidable; yet just as unavoidable, but also incomprehensible, [is]
their identity’9. Indeed, the empirical ego belongs to the natural
attitude and its relative determinations. As a result, phenomeno-
logical attack of the natural attitude also has to be an exclusion
of the individuated ego. But, ‘those manifolds of self-experience in
7 Id I, pp. 124, 103.
8 Id I, pp. 127, 105.
9 C, p. 202, §57.
which the ego’s transcendental life and habitual properties are given’
invalidate again the mere redundant, phenomenological invention
of an empty consciousness10. Contrary to our previous outcome, the
transcendental ego appears thus to have personal characteristics, ha-
bitualities that distinguish it from other egos and correlates it to its
empirical side. In this context, is it then possible to preserve indi-
viduality within a transcendental analysis? Is individuation retained
with the advent of a transcendentally pure consciousness? In order to
answer these questions let us direct our attention to the last part of
Crisis11 which discusses the difference between the empirical and the
transcendental subjectivity, the way in which the two are identical,
and how this identification is to be performed.
Psychology and transcendental phenomenology

As Husserl points out in this text, as a transcendental ego I
inquire into the constitutive conditions of the world. At the same
time, as an empirical ego, I am part of the world that, in a reflective
attitude, I can reduce to a transcendental level of understanding12.
How is it then possible to grasp the identification or congruence of
the mundane and the transcendental? How is the spatiotemporal
mundane ego, the naïve human ego that exists in the world and is
determined by a particular way of relating to it, identical to/differ-
ent from the transcendental ego13? The answer is presented in the
form of a new reductive path to transcendental phenomenology,
10 CM, pp. 28, 67.
11 C, Part III B.
12 C, p. 202, §57.
13 Referring to the same issue, D. Carr (The Paradox of Subjectivity, New
York, Oxford University Press, 1999) notices that ‘the key to the difference
between transcendental and empirical subjects is to be found not in the
internal structures of consciousness – that is, in its relation to itself – but
rather in its relation to the world’ (p. 90).
which originates in psychology and which also clarifies the ultimate

paradoxical relation between the two disciplines.
Starting with Logical Investigations, Husserl attempts to distin-
guish phenomenology from explanatory psychology. Though both
are concerned with the psychic, phenomenology is an inquiry into
the essences of psychic facts or mental phenomena and is, thus, an
eidetic science. The difference between the two seems to reside in the
fact that whereas psychology takes consciousness to be part of the
world, phenomenology, conversely, stresses its intentional relation
to the world. Anticipating the Neo-Kantians’ criticism with regard
to the manner in which phenomenology misconstrued transcenden-
tal philosophy by degenerating into a kind of psychology, Husserl
considers critically the difference between the two. Even in Crisis,
Husserl’s approach to psychology is first of all critical: psychology
has developed historically as a science of the soul in a manner similar
to the way in which physics has studied the material nature. But for
Husserl this psychophysical dualistic split conceals a more profound
moment in psychology that could propel the self-understanding of a
transcendental phenomenology. As Husserl states, ‘if psychology had
not failed, it would have performed a necessary mediating work for a
concrete, working transcendental philosophy’14. Psychology, science
of the psychic being, has to be radicalised methodologically, purified
by reflection upon its genuine task, taken beyond its empirical form
and factual considerations.
In the natural attitude, psychology focuses on the natural data,
which define or influence the human ego, generalising, on an em-
pirical ground, experiences that form the core of human conscious-
ness. Nonetheless, it is only within a transcendental scope that the
one-sided attitude of empirical psychology can be taken further, to
a new level of reflection and self-objectification. For psychology,
14 C, p. 203, §57.
the world is a primal givenness and the ego is an unquestioned part

of it, interacting with other human beings, having different world-
apperceptions. At this level, a certain ‘alliance’ between psychology
and phenomenology is built since through self-objectification and
transcendental reflection psychology could lead to absolute subjec-
tivity. Indeed, the subject matter of psychology is subjectivity, and,
from this perspective, though in a different way and pursuing a
distinctive scientific ground, the domains of psychology and that of
transcendental phenomenology coincide. But with this discovery
the task of explaining the paradoxical identity between the empiri-
cal ego and the transcendental subject remains as acute as before.
Before analysing Husserl’s reductive path step by step, it is
important to notice that the transcendental attitude is constantly
presupposed in the transition from empirical psychology to tran-
scendental philosophy. As Husserl declares, the alliance between
the two disciplines ‘could of course not be accessible prior to the
transcendental reduction’15. This allows us to understand and see
the transcendental ego, even when concealed by the naïve natural
attitude, as the reverse of the empirical ego and its concrete di-
mension as a worldly being. However, Husserl’s approach remains
highly problematic if the reductive path that takes psychology as its
starting point has, among its background assumptions, an antici-
pation of the transcendentally reduced ego. In this perspective, the
psychological reductive path, far from leading to a new and origi-
nal way of access to phenomenology, seems to be a needless de-
tour that does not enrich our transcendental attitude. Nonetheless,
this impression is entirely wrong since the reduction from empiri-
cal psychology to transcendental philosophy is to be conceived
as a methodological anticipation, a complete development of the
themes and questions set out by a transcendental phenomenology.
15 C, p. 207, §58.
However, this latent transcendental aspect is to be further developed

by the reductive move. The result of the reduction is not identical
to the assumption stated at the beginning of the pathway from psy-
chology to transcendental philosophy. Commenting on this idea,
E. Ströker notices that ‘we are not faced here with a specific vi-
cious circle, but rather with a specific hermeneutic situation which
Husserl creates for phenomenology with its turn to psychology’16.
Indeed, throughout the study of the concrete human subjectivity,
transcendental philosophy is transformed, enriched, self-extended,
revealed in a different light. Thus, the transition to transcendental
subjectivity, which starts ‘from the manner in which souls are pre-
given in the life-world’17, evolves from the sphere of human con-
creteness, through reflection, to a purified subjectivity.
The phenomenological-psychological reduction

Psychology needs to overcome the traditional Cartesian dualism
and its psychophysicist prejudice, which models souls on physical
reality and parallels psychology to physics. In this sense, in order to
become the impulse for a phenomenological reduction, psychology
has to abandon the scientific concepts of the naturalistic tradition
and go back to pure experiences and their original sense, to the
pre-scientific life-world. We have to underline here the fact that the
life-world, the world of primal experience, is the original source of
self-evidence in the psychological reduction. Accordingly, the em-
pirical inquiry that constitutes the basis of empirical psychology has
to return with genuine radicalism to itself, reflect upon its own pre-
suppositions and understand the essentiality of the psychic. Factual
psychology is to be established, therefore, on an eidetic basis that
16 E. Ströker, The Husserlian Foundations of Science, Dordrecht, Kluwer Aca-
demic Publishers, 1997, p. 150.
17 C, p. 211, §60.
brings forth a description of the essence proper to the psychic. Far

from considering the soul to be a mere analogue of the physical
dimension, a subject matter of natural sciences, Husserl is interest-
ed in revealing the essential, intentional complexity of the psychic
through a reflective study of the essential structure of the ego’s inner
life and its pure consciousness. What phenomenological psychol-
ogy achieves is not a mere generalisation of factual elements since
Husserl clearly distinguishes between abstractive, eidetic variation
and generalisation based on empirical data. Here lies the difference
between empirical psychology and phenomenological psychology:
the first discipline is a factual investigation, while the second one is
a pure eidetic science which does not justify itself through reference
to factual reality. Moreover, Husserl considers the eidetic psychol-
ogy to form the original source that offers legitimacy to empirical
psychology. However, the eidetic insight has to be taken further
by a phenomenological-psychological reduction which opens the
way to a descriptive psychology. As for the difference between
phenomenological-psychological reduction and the transcenden-
tal one, Husserl notes the fact that, though methodologically they
proceed in the same way, they diverge in interests18. That is to say,
the phenomenological-psychological reduction is designated to be
a method for uncovering the original source of ‘psychology as a posi-
tive science’19, whereas the transcendental reduction implies a level
of universality, which surpasses regional theoretical interests. Yet, the
two reductions are identical in terms of results and procedure20.
The immediate givenness of the psychic life, which appears
through a descriptive reflective grasp, is the intentional aspect of con-
sciousness, which manifests itself in relation to various intentional
18 C, p. 256, §71.
19 C, p. 256, §71.
20 C, p. 257, §72.
experiences of the real world. To quote Husserl on this matter, ‘the

proper essence of the psychic itself includes the fact that it has the
character of meaning objects’21. However, in order to accede to a de-
scriptive psychology, a real scientific study of the psychic and its inten-
tional relations, a reduction of the habitualities and interests, which
define the natural stance of every human being, is imperative. Hence,
the universal epoché is performed to reveal the pure internal structure
of the intentional ego-life and go beyond the actual set of experiences
of individuals. As Husserl notes, in the case of the psychologist, the
epoché ‘involves refraining … from the concurrent performance of
his own validities as exercised in the manner of natural everyday life
in relation to real things in the objective world’22. The psychologist
becomes, as a result, a ‘disinterested spectator’23 that takes the actual
validity of intentional experiences to be a mere phenomenon. The
universality of intentional life and its essential purity is the major goal
of his investigations, which lead to a pure, descriptive psychology.
This is the way in which the psychological epoché, departing from the
actual mundane experiences, is constituted by a return of psychology
to its most original sense, i.e. the universal nexus of intentionalities
and their essential manifold structure.
The discovery of transcendental philosophy brings into focus
the connection between the empirical and the transcendental ego.
Indeed, as E. Ströker remarks, ‘the way of psychology has shown that
now the transcendental ego is not simply “another” ego, besides or
above, as it were, the empirical ego’24. The one is the reverse-side of
the other, intimately correlated and intertwined in the intentional re-
lation with the world. At the same type, the psychological reduction
is not directed so much towards intentional objects, constituted by
21 C, p. 245, §71
22 C, p. 239, §69.
23 C, p. 239, §69.
24 E. Ströker, op. cit., p. 165.
the ego; the focus of the investigation is rather the ego’s own consti-
tution. From this perspective, this reductive path is a genetic inves-
tigation into the essential structure and historical auto-generation of
transcendental subjectivity.
To sum up, the psychological-phenomenological reduction
stresses the concrete dimension of the transcendental ego and its ge-
netic becoming. In this context, the mundane experience is revealed
as forming the point of departure for the discovery of the essential
structures of subjectivity, as premise of the reduction. Therefore, the
subject in its concrete relation to the world cannot be suspended, or
‘annihilated’, but has to be taken as a first step towards transcenden-
tal subjectivity. The empirical ego is not an accidental characteristic
which has to be nullified, but an essential index for a deepening of
the transcendental reduction. But is the transcendental ego involved
in this reduction different from the eidos ego of the eidetic variation?
The transcendental eidos ego/the eidos transcendental ego

In §34 of the Forth Cartesian Meditation, Husserl presents
the necessity of completing our insight into the phenomenologi-
cal reduction by introducing the method of eidetic description,
‘which at the beginning would have increased the difficulties of
understanding’25. Exemplifying using the eidetic variation of a per-
ceptual act, which, separated from its factual context, becomes es-
sential in the sense of a pure universality of a type, Husserl points
to the formation of a different eidetic region: the eidos ego, ‘a pure
possibility-variant of my de facto ego’26. The eidetic reduction op-
erates thus a transformation of the factual ego, of the ‘empirically
25 CM, pp. 69, 103.
26 CM, pp. 71, 105.
factual transcendental ego into the pure eidetic sphere’27. The ego
executing the reduction, or the ‘meditating ego’ engaging himself
in the reductive path, has to take his considerations a step further.
As a result, the de facto ego is to be conceived solely as a possibil-
ity of the eidos ego – ‘an infinity of forms, an infinity of a priori
types of actualities and potentialities of life’28. At the level of an
eidetic insight, the ego loses his individuality by becoming an in-
variant form, or a universal possibility. It is interesting to note,
in this context, the surprising difference that separates the eidos
ego from the ego conceived in line with a psychological reduction.
Indeed, whereas the former eludes concreteness and individuality,
the latter presents a rich transcendental ego, which is characterised
by subjective habitual qualities. How are we then to explain this
uneasy inconsistency and understand the individuation of a tran-
scendental ego?
The reason for the above-mentioned difference is rooted in the
two possible ways of effecting the epoché. Firstly, performing the
transcendental transition from modes of being to modes of being
intended, or modes of givenness, Husserl transforms the empirical
ego into its transcendental equivalent. Subsequently, by an eidetic
variation, the transcendental ego becomes the eidos ego, i.e. the eidos
transcendental ego. In the second reductive type, this order is re-
versed: immersed in the natural attitude, we perform first the eidetic
transition from facts to essences, i.e. from the empirical ego to the
eidos ego. At a second reductive level, the eidos ego is ‘parenthesised’
in its concreteness, so as to reveal the transcendental eidos ego.
Without distinguishing in a clear manner between the pure
ego as it results from the performance of either the transcenden-
tal, or the eidetic reductions, Husserl makes space in his texts for
27 CM, pp. 71, 105.
28 CM, pp. 74, 108.
different interpretations and paradoxical conclusions. With regard

to the problem of individuation of a transcendental ego, the lack
of clarity demands further elucidation. The eidetic reduction of a
transcendental ego has to be differentiated from the transcendental
reduction of the eidos ego. Indeed, by differentiating the transcen-
dental eidos ego from the eidos transcendental ego29, the transcen-
dental community of monads becomes more than a tautological
repetition of the same. In this sense, it has to be stressed that no
real community is possible after the execution of the eidetic re-
duction since the all-inclusive eide neutralise individuals and their
habitual dispositions. The psychic subject and its empirical man-
ner of relating to the natural world can only be preserved with a
change of focus that transfers actuality into a mere phenomenon.
Stated differently, the transcendental ego, as intending pole, grasps
natural experience with all its habitual layers, yet not as an existing
actuality, but as a meaning-formation. Thus, the personal subjec-
tivity and its intending acts are to be envisaged, after the reduction,
as a flowing stream of transcendental lived experiences. It is in this
sense that Husserl asserts that the pure I is not simply ‘a dead pole
of identity’, but ‘the I of affections and actions, the I which has its
life in the stream of lived experiences’30. Referring to the transcen-
dental ego, Husserl notes in Phenomenological Psychology that the
‘I’ is a ‘pole of habitualities’31, determined by a specific historical
genesis and particular convictions. Defined in these terms, the ‘I’
is a monadic ego, caught in passive and active syntheses through
which it ‘acquires its personal unity and becomes a subject of a
29 Cf. E. Ströker (Husserl’s Transcendental Phenomenology, trans. L. Hardy,
Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1993, p. 78), where the
confusing order in which Husserl uses the two reductions to the transcen-
dental ego is also stressed.
30 PP, pp. 159, 208.
31 PP, pp. 161, 211.
surrounding world’32. Accordingly, the transcendental reduction,

which starts with the ego of the investigator33 and his subjective
lived experiences, reveals an individualised pure subjectivity. To
quote Husserl, ‘the purely phenomenological attitude [is] “purely”
personal, “purely” historical’34.
b. The habitual ego

Towards genetic phenomenology
The analysis of the relation between the personal subject and the
transcendental ego has been based on the assumption that the pure
ego is individualised by its intentional acts. The determination of
the concrete pure ego, which appears in genetic inquiries, as ego of
affections, is profoundly connected to the idea of temporal fluctua-
tion. However, it is important to note that the relation of the pure I
to its mental processes is extremely complex. On this question, the
development from a static description of the ego, as an empty endur-
ing pole of identity throughout lived experiences, to a generic version
of an I that is determined by its sense-sediments, is reflected on the
manner in which the pure ego connects to its intentional acts.
The human person is individualised by specific acts, which,
in the natural attitude, relate to the world as existent. Considered
within the scope of a static phenomenology, the personal being-pos-
iting acts are merely intentional and point to meaning-formations
rather than modes of existence. After the execution of the epoché,
32 PP, pp. 165, 216.
33 ‘within the phenomenological reduction the investigation is first naturally
carried out just as we have done, that is, as an investigation of that pure
subjectivity which the investigator finds before him in first originality,
namely, as the pure subjectivity of his I’, PP, pp. 165, 216.
34 PP, pp. 176, 230.
the pure ego remains a necessary ground, ‘something absolutely

identical throughout every actual or possible change in mental pro-
cesses’, an abstractive unity which ‘cannot in any sense be a really
inherent part or moment of the mental processes themselves’35. In
this context, the ego is to be conceived as an anonymous pole, a
form of experience rather than a flowing act. This implies that the
content of the pure ego is to be distinguished, as cogitata, from
the formal purity of the ego. Nevertheless, the ego of static analy-
ses seems to resemble more an eidetic form than a transcendental
concrete subjectivity. Indeed, if we are to operate the distinction
between the ego-pole and its mental acts, then the pure ego cannot
be individuated, or appropriated from a non-universal stance. As
Husserl notices in Ideas I, the ego without its intentional acts ‘has
no explicable content, is undescribable in and for itself: it is pure
ego and nothing more’36. So, if we adopt a static phenomenologi-
cal standpoint, the problematic of individuation has to be reduced
to the relation between the natural subject, i.e. the human being
in the natural attitude, and the transcendental pure ego, eidetic
formal pole that is to be abstracted from its contents. But Husserl
becomes immediately aware of the limitation of this project since
a pure ego that is an empty form cannot solve the famous paradox
‘of a humanity as world-constituting subjectivity and yet as incor-
porated in the world itself ’37. In other words, a transcendental ego
that is separated from its mundane individuality gives rise to irre-
futable, paradoxical contentions.
Husserl’s move from static to genetic phenomenology intro-
duces a deeper approach to both the problem of individuation at
a transcendental level of inquiry, and the relationship of the pure
ego to its acts. Indeed, it is not only the ‘historical’ givenness of
35 Id I, pp. 132, 109.
36 Id I, pp. 191, 161.
37 C §54, p. 182.
an object-as-meant that becomes important, but, along with the

experience of sedimentation on this ‘objective’ side, phenomenol-
ogy also presupposes a generic structure of consciousness. Every
constitution is grounded in a concrete and continual unfolding of
the intentional object, which is to be considered within the tempo-
ral becoming of its appearances. But transcendental consciousness
itself has a genetic context and its self-giving process is ‘historical’,
involving a synthetical activity in relation to its own unity. Thus,
the transcendental subjectivity is not a static and abstractive struc-
ture anymore, but a concrete pole, characterised as having a per-
sonal substance, habitualities. The ego is a self-constituting pole,
concretely determined by its personal style. As Husserl asserts in
Cartesian Meditations ‘the ego constitutes himself for himself in,
so to speak, the unity of a “history”’38. In contrast to the invari-
ant eidetic approach to the ego that procures universality, the ge-
neric emphasis of the factual, revealing the limitations of the ei-
detic method and the necessity to deepen the static role of essences,
points to a historical constitution. The variation that the eidetic
reduction effectuates is based on the existential priority of facts
over imaginative universality. If it the teleological aspect of genetic
analyses gives priority to the eidos over fact, then, in order to dis-
cover the singular by means of a phenomenological investigation,
we have to distinguish between genesis and validity. Hence, let us
return from the invariant eidos to the life of the ego as it appears
within the primordial levels of factual existence.
The generic ego

With the discovery of the generic nature of the transcendental
ego, Husserl seems to make allowances to the individual character-
38 CM, pp. 75, 109.
istics of the ego-life. In this sense, the historical approach opens the
way to a rich subject with his own material legitimacy. In contrast,
the eidetic reduction of the transcendental corresponds precisely to
the definition of phenomenology as infinite task because eidos ego
can only exists as an open, regulative idea. Phenomenology, which
has been described by Husserl as ‘a self-explication of the ego, car-
ried out with continuous evidence and at the same time with con-
creteness’39, is, in its eidetic insight, the project of an ideal and uni-
versal ego. As transparent, the ego is merely presumptive, lacking
forever any final determination40. The ego, thus defined, is the un-
derlying stratum on which Husserl can build his idea of philosophy
as a rigorous science. But the transcendental ego itself, comprised
in relation to particular acts, is for Husserl no more than an ideal
structuring the living acts of the subject. The transcendental is a
global vision that embraces the particular sense-bestowing acts, a
synthetic grasp that goes beyond the mere actuality of givenness.
In this sense, between the eidetic and the merely synthetic ego, the
transcendental ego is a methodological abstraction, which main-
tains its identity against the straightforward lived, actual experi-
ence. The transcendental ego is a phenomenological notion similar
to the perceptual object, which is considered to remain unchanged
during the process of variation of its modes of appearance. As an
objective unity is constituted within the stream of manifold as-
pects, in the same manner the transcendental ego is postulated as a
unitary stream that remains unchanged with regard to its own acts.
As the unity of the perceptual object is not altered in the case of a
39 CM, pp. 85, 118.
40 As D. Carr remarks, about the transcendental ego: ‘it might be said to have
the status of a theoretical fiction, comparable, let us say, to the freely falling
body of Newtonian physics or the “average consumer” of statistics’ (op . cit.,
p. 95).
deceptive perception, since it is the intentional object and not the

object as such which is constituted as identical, in the same way the
transcendental ego is never to be invalidated by its concrete life. It
is in this sense that the transcendental is said to be immortal: a con-
struct cannot die because of situational evidence. In other words,
the transcendental ego, being reflective, can exist only on the basis
of the living ego. But it is solely the latter that can die since death
has no sense for reflection. As Husserl notes, ‘in a certain respect
every human ego harbours its transcendental ago, and this does
not die and does not arise; it is an eternal being in the process of
becoming’41. Or, in a different paragraph, ‘transcendental life and
the transcendental ego cannot be born; only the human being in
the world can be born’42. Thus, the transcendental ego as individ-
ual is still an abstraction, a solidified structure that Husserl’s inter-
est in epistemology reveals in opposition to the empirical being of
the subject. We can say that static phenomenology has obstructed
Husserl to develop a veritable concern for subjectivity. The concern
for ready-made sense-formations produces only abstractive general
structures of consciousness. From this point of view, the unveil-
ing of the history of consciousness in genetic analyses brings forth
an interest in the factual and concrete entanglement of acts. The
ego is no longer an empty pole of intentional identity, an abstract
ego-pole, but a living unity, characterised by capabilities and dis-
positions. As a result, the transcendental ego appears as a synthetic
unity, or style, that identifies itself through all its lived-experiences.
But once more, the ego is devoid of any existential grip on its life
and the question of individuation is reduced to a quest for
tautology. The transcendental ego, being a construct, is abstractive,
its personal characteristic being based on the living ego.
41 ASAP, pp. 471, 381.

42 ASAP, pp. 469, 379.
c. The passive ego

Primal and secondary passivity
The transcendental ego is representational, grounded in a sub-
sequent recuperation of life. Its self-constitution does not abide
to its flowing life, but searches to posit the subject as ‘the same
I’, as a ‘synthesis, which embraces all the particular multiplicities
of cogitationes collectively … as belonging to the identical Ego.43
But Husserl seems to be aware of the controversial nature of this
tautological ego, which has an ideal, unreal structure. Accordingly,
he notices that ‘from the ego as identical pole, and as substrate of
habitualities, we distinguish the ego taken in full concreteness – in
that we take, in addition, that without which the ego cannot after
all be concrete’44. What this means is that the ego has to be consid-
ered in correlation with intentionally constituted objects. In other
words, the habitual ego is based on an experiential ego – the ego
in the world – which is pre-reflective and does not seek to impose
universality upon the particularity of a factical situation. This is the
ego of sensibility, the affected subject of lived experience, which
is not abstractly constituting itself as universal, nor apprehending
his life as identical. If the singularity of the transcendental ego has
to have a meaning at all for phenomenology45, it is at the level of
concrete experience and not as representational consciousness that
particularity can be revealed.
43 CM, pp. 66, 100.
44 CM, pp. 67, 102.
45 It is significant to note that, despite its artificial and abstractive core, the
transcendental ego understood as non-generic can be regarded as an im-
portant example of singularity. However, this hypothesis does not develop
in line with our interest in particularity and will, subsequently, be dis-
cussed in more detail in the next chapter, when we refer to time-constitut-
ing consciousness.
Representational thought is systematic and breaches the pres-

ence of life. The transcendental unity of the ego is not the product
of a living present, but of the delay of reflection upon the reflected
ego. According to genetic analyses, the transcendental ego has a
history of sense-sedimentation and is the substrate of its habituali-
ties. At this point though, the question of individuation separates
itself from the issue of primordial singularity insofar as the habitual
ego is repetitive and acquires similarity to the reflective subject. It
is to this aspect that the distinction between primal and second-
ary passivity refers. Thus, we can read in Experience and Judgement
that ‘there is not only a passivity prior to the activity, as passivity
of the originally constitutive temporal flux, which is only pre-con-
stitutive, but also a passivity erected on this, a passivity which is
truly objectivating’46. What Husserl wants to point out is the fact
that the passivity of habitualities is a ‘passivity in activity’ since ‘the
distinction between passivity and activity is not inflexible’ at this
level47. If there is a passivity that presents itself as being prior to
reason and as a basis for all posterior activities of the ego, there is
also a combination of active intentionality and passivity at the level
of a secondary sensibility. In Ideas II48 Husserl, after distinguishing
sensibility from reason, stresses that with regard to the former it is
necessary to differentiate ‘primal sensibility, which does not con-
tain any sediment of reason, and the secondary sensibility, which
arises through a production of reason’49. It is indeed imperative to
relate the genetic disclosure of a habitual ego to the function of this
secondary sensibility that recovers itself as hybrid passivity, as a sedi-
mentation which acts like reason. Primal sensibility, on the contrary,
46 EJ, §23a, p. 108.
47 EJ, §23a, p. 108.
48 Supplement XII (‘The Person – The Spirit and its psychic basis’).
49 Id II, pp. 345, 334.
is the primitive receptivity of the ego, the fundamental, sensuous

nature of the pre-reflective subject. Completing this description of
the passive strata of ego’s life, Husserl notes that ‘perhaps a better
terminology would result from distinguishing between authentic
and inauthentic sensibility and by speaking as regards the latter of
intelective or spiritual sensibility and as regards the former of spirit-
less sensibility’50. In fact, what the secondary sensibility adds to the
primitive one is a set of tendencies, a historical becoming in light
of generative constitutional analyses. The secondary passivity intro-
duces this openness to past living-experiences that forms the ground
of transcendental subjectivity. It is in this sense that the habitual
ego is a tautological individual, a set of dispositions that are already
subsequent in relation to a primordial ego. However, Husserl’s
quest for a scientific description opens even the most primitive of
passive strata to representation and activity. The sphere of receptiv-
ity is, in fact, open to representation and activity. As he remarks,
‘the lowest ego-spontaneity or ego-activity is “receptivity”’51. This
observation recalls another one from Experience and Judgement: the
sense of the distinction between activity and passivity is not rigid
but ‘must in each case be recreated originally with reference to the
concrete situation of the analysis’52. Thus, if singularity is to be re-
ferred to primal passivity, it is important to underline this inability
to accept pure receptivity within a systematic transcendental inves-
tigation. The main reason for the ambiguous nature of sensibility
is the representational nature of phenomenology which imposes
a pattern of self-distancing in the life of the ego. The givenness of
objects by the primordial ego in passivity is also teleological and,
thus, when transcendentally considered, primal sensibility gives us
50 Id II, pp. 346, 334.
51 Id II, pp. 347, 335.
52 EJ §23a, p. 108.
a factual origin, but not a primitive validity. However, primordial

constitution has to return to the moment of receptivity where the
generic nature of the ego is interrupted or, to be more precise, to
the level that grounds any genesis. The reflection on primal sensi-
bility makes possible the constitution of the event. The active gene-
sis, which secondary passivity refers to, is the product of a historical
and synthetic consciousness that is founded on an anterior passive
genesis. Discussing the characteristics of the derivative forms of
passivity, Husserl notes: ‘on the ego side there becomes constituted
a consequent habituality of continuing acceptance, which there-
upon is part of the constitution of the object as simply existing for
the ego’53. The synthetic subject of secondary passivity, which can
develop subsequent forms of passivity54 (cultural acquisitions), is
a historical ego, in opposition to ‘the primal institutive original,
[which] is always livingly present’55.
The anonymity of the ‘sleeping’ ego
Let us now return to the connection between the habitual ego

and reason in order to comprehend the space introduced in the
singular by the transcendental. We can here refer to another dis-
tinction: the one between the non-thematic ego and the thematic
reflective subject. If it is unquestionable that for Husserl ‘”recep-
tivity includes a lowest level of activity’56, the distinction between
53 CM, pp.78, 111.
54 Cf. N. Depraz, ‘Imagination and Passivity. Husserl and Kant: A Cross-re-
lationship’ (Alterity and Facticity, N. Depraz & D. Zahavi eds., Dordrecht,
Kluwer, 1998), pp. 29-57.
55 CM, pp. 112, 142.
56 Id II, pp. 225, 213.
the two remains an important one. The lower passive layers are
better described as belonging to an anonymous subject, which is
also a sleeping ego. But what the anonymous aspect points to here
is, in fact, the lack of self-reflection and not the possibility of a
non-existing subject. In Ideas II, the sleeping ego of the primor-
dial passivity is described as ‘complete immersion in ego-matter,
in the hyle, … undifferentiated ego-being’57. Differentiation is, in
this context, nothing else than reflective self-perception of a living
ego and its immediate sensibility. At the primitive level of constitu-
tion, ‘nothing subjective is found’ as our ‘subjectivity remains so
to speak anonymous to itself ’58. This anonymity is lost through
reflection, by a ‘turning of regard away from the experienced thing
and its determinations as a thing toward the subjective modes of
appearance of the thing and then eventually toward me myself ’59.
But this is precisely what the transcendental reduction introduces
in relation to the natural life of the subject. In this sense, we can
affirm that passivity brings the transcendental to the limits of its
methodological grip and that the interest in modes of givenness is
challenged by the existence of a pre-given ego. It is interesting to
observe that, our quest for singularity, the anonymity of the sub-
ject appears as the only valid field of investigation. The anonymity
of existence, though, is not the suffocating tautology that Levinas
presents in Existence and Existents; it is rather the impossibility of
naming, or of bringing under the rule of repetition. Anonymity is
thus the passivity of the non-reflected-upon-ego, the locus of the
living subject, which precedes self-reflection. Sleeping in the stream
of life, this latent self is the non-self-instituting I, the ego that does
not yet have habitualities or history. The transcendental requires
57 Id II, pp. 265, 253.
58 PP, pp. 112, 147.
59 PP, pp. 112, 147.
a generic ego; this is the way in which the declaration ‘the purely
phenomenological attitude, as “purely” personal, “purely” histori-
cal’60 has to be interpreted. If singularity resembles the event, then
anonymity seems to be the only ground that escapes the cognitive
production of the transcendental and the delay imposed by rep-
etition upon the immediate existence. The singular is that which
escapes the grips of classificatory thought and synthetic unity. But
can phenomenology accept a singular givenness in the form of a
remaining now? To this question, Husserl replies by invoking the
pre-egological constitution of time, which offers the numerical
uniqueness and the centrality of a form that cannot become a mo-
ment of a multiplicity. With this solution in mind, which we will
discuss in the third chapter, let us now turn to the particularity
of transcendent objects. As we have noted in the first section of
this chapter, the transcendental particularity is repetitive and refers
to an inner historicity. When confronted to the ultimate passivity
that founds particular geneses, the transcendental ego becomes an
anonymous form that escapes temporal flowing. Consequently, in
the constitution of a transcendental particularity, the ego is either
a repetitive and synthetic unity, or, if the passive constitutive layers
are unveiled, an anonymous and a-temporal form. The first alterna-
tive is not satisfactory for our study insofar as singularity is invali-
dated by a habitual self-genesis and merely derivative. The second
clarification, though, might offer a solution to our exploration of a
phenomenology of singularity and will be thoughtfully analysed in
our next chapter. But, we cannot reject the hypothesis of a particu-
lar singularity without reflecting on thing-constitution. Thus, are
transcendent objects singular in a way that eludes repetitive con-
stitution? In fact, in contrast to transcendental individuals, objects
60 PP, pp. 176, 230.
seem to be devoid of inner historicity and habitual genesis: they do

not have recollective states, nor do they have habitualities. So, let
us investigate, in the second section of this chapter, the possibility
of a transcendental singularity in relation to thing-constitution..
2.The singularity of things

a. Perceptual objects
Perceptual horizons
Sensuous perception is considered in Ideas I to be the primor-
dial and exemplary ego-activity in the encounter of things. As stat-
ed in §39, ‘sensuous perception…plays the role among experiencing
acts of what may be called, in a certain legitimate sense, a primal
experience from which all other experiencing acts derive a major
part of their grounding force’61. Because of this feature, the sur-
rounding objects are given to us primarily on the basis of our per-
ceptual being, as an original presence. Our perceptual experience,
though, has one more characteristic: we never experience isolated
things or items in the world but rather an interchange of actual
profiles and potential perspectives. With regard to the relation be-
tween possible and actual perceptions Husserl notes: ‘every actual-
ity involves its potentialities, which are not empty possibilities, but
rather possibilities intentionally pre-delineated in respect of con-
tent – namely, in the actual subjective process itself – and, in addi-
tion, having the character of possibilities actualisable by the Ego’62.
This is ‘an intentional horizon of reference’ to potential processes of
61 Id I, pp. 82, 70.
62 CM, pp. 44, 82. Cf. C, p. 159: ‘implied in the particular perception of
the thing is a whole “horizon” of non-active [nichtaktuelle] and yet co-
functioning manners of appearance and syntheses of validity’.
consciousness. Perception is, as a result, not restricted to the part

perceived but also encompasses sides that are only meant but not
actually perceived, perceptions that we could have through a differ-
ent perceptual activity. Consequently, the actual perception of an
object unveils aspects of that thing that could be hidden from other
perceptual perspectives upon the same object. This ‘internal hori-
zon’ renders perception a mere presumptive activity that remains
endless with regard to its perfection. At the same time, perception
comprises an ‘external horizon’63 of potential things, a co-given
surrounding of particular objects that could be brought into focus
by further perceptual directedness. These co-present objects form a
halo of more or less distinct or clear perceptions, a horizon of inde-
terminate actual perspectives. The horizon-structure of perception
implies that there is always an excess of meaning that surpasses the
actual moment of perception. The interplay between actuality and
potentiality in relation to the modes of givenness of objects is com-
pleted, on the side of the subject and its acts, by a temporal hori-
zon. That is to say, as Husserl points out, ‘to every perception there
always belongs a horizon of the past, as a potentiality of awakenable
recollections’, with their specific horizon and so on64. Husserl calls
this a play between ‘I can and do, but I can also do otherwise than
I am doing’65. A given horizon is always accompanied by new ho-
rizons continually opened, unfolded, co-intended, indeterminate.
The temporal structure of the intending ego, the halo of every con-
sciousness, opens the way to a genetic constitution, a historical be-
coming that goes beyond the static abstractive analyses. However,
our discussion will be restrained for the moment to a static inves-
tigation of the modes of givenness of real objects. In this sense, we
63 C, p. 162, §47.
64 CM, pp. 44, 82.
65 CM, pp. 45, 82.
have to underline the fact that every object is a pole of meaning,

which includes intentional potential processes. To quote Husserl,
‘this intending-beyond-itself, which is implicit in any consciousness,
must be considered an essential moment of it’66. Every perception
of a thing has therefore a background of horizonal intuitions, a
potential experiential halo of other possible positings.
Marginal and focal attention

Perceptual objects, which appear as more or less determinate,
more or less clear, guide our intentional fields. It is a change of at-
tention that reveals and calls for an active intentional act towards
hidden parts co-present in the halo of our actual perception. This
halo that forms an intrinsic part of the perceptual field, is the realm
of the unthematised, which can become objectified only through
an alteration of my attention, given as an attentive perceiving. As
co-present in the perceptive act, these objects are given in a man-
ner that involves a passivity of the intentional consciousness that
intends them in a non-active, non-conceptual way. In other words,
Husserl uncovers on the side of the co-present horizon of percep-
tion a peculiar type of intuition ‘which involves no conceptual
thinking and which changes into a clear intuiting only with the
advertence of attention, and even then only partially and for the
most part very imperfectly’67. This ‘empty mist of obscure indeter-
minateness’68, as Husserl terms it, is the realm of marginal, implicit
attention that accompanies focal perception. Those sides of the ob-
ject that are not clear can become clear and afterwards change again
into unclear and non-present. The physical thing presents every
66 CM, pp. 46, 84.
67 Id I, pp .52, 49.
68 Id I, pp. 52, 49.
time different sides that can be completely new ones or old ones
returning69, merging into one another to create the unity of the
perceived object. Among these continua of our actual perceptions,
our practical interests decide, in the natural attitude, which one of
them should be considered as the normal vision of the thing per-
ceived (e.g. the perception of colours in the daytime, or of a thing
from a certain perspective). However, retaining a mode of appear-
ance as the normal vision of the thing perceived implies a mental
process of objectification that eliminates the other appearances and
presents the one-sided perspective as the optimal one. Nevertheless,
even this normal vision of a thing does not elude the characteristics
that perception imposes upon it, that is to say incompleteness and
imperfection. This is a point constantly stressed by Husserl when
describing the contrasts between the perception of a physical thing
and that of a mental process, which is given absolutely and without
adumbrations [Abschattungen].
b. Objects as synthetic unities

Identity-formations
With regard to the transcendence of things another aspect has
to be underlined: namely, the fact that a consciousness of iden-
tity operates in the case of each perception. That is to say, a con-
structing consciousness, merely presumptive in relation to the pure
givenness of perceptual sides of an object, gathers all elements into
a unifying perception. In this sense, the constitution of things is
repetitive, synthetic, and based on identities. Even the distinction
that is established between things that appear as separated by their
own qualitative determinations is possible only because they can
69 Id I, pp. 94, 80.
be integrated into a wider unity. Eventually, the fragmentation of the

environment into a multitude of individual things is based on the
synthetic nexus of objectivity and on a higher consciousness of unity.
The consciousness of a thing in the world is, thus, grounded on
connections established between perceptual aspects of the same thing.
Hence, we can say that ‘perceptions stand in the synthesis of identifi-
cation, the unity of the identity-consciousness encompasses them’70.
It is, thus, obvious that perception imposes, from a phenomenologi-
cal perspective, a unification of the meant object in the modes of
its being meant. Consciousness intends a unification of all data into
identity formations. We pursue the identical through the manifold
of appearances, constructing on the actual an ideal sameness, a core
of non-variability that forms the immanent equivalent of the “real”
thing. The singular aspects are always integrated into representational
unities, which conform to the continuity existing within the constitu-
tional activity of consciousness. This ‘consciousness of selfsameness’71,
as Husserl names it, is, in fact, an intentional consciousness since the
living experience presents passing aspects, rather than unified percep-
tions. The intentional relation to an object, while leaving aside con-
siderations regarding the real existence of singular objects, refers to
the subjective intending of transcendence. And, as we have seen in
our prior analyses, the consciousness of an object is either identity-
oriented, or a differentiation consciousness, the latter one being again
classificatory in its essence.
Anticipation and interpretation

In perception, appearances are given as belonging to a certain
unity, which prescribes the direction of the perceptual activity of
70 DR, pp. 24, 27.
71 DR, pp. 24, 28.
the subject. This anticipation is merely presumptive, as we have

already determined, and sets an idea about the telos of the percep-
tion. It is, thus, obvious that in the course of a perception, every
singular moment is brought to unification in continuity, so that a
sense of completeness is acquired. The object is an identical pole
only insofar as it contains continuous re-constructions in syntheses
of identification, or differentiation. Phenomenological givenness
imposes on the appearing of any objective ‘individual’ an endless
unification, which perfects its ideal core in further perceptive in-
tentions. The continuity of adumbrations belonging to the percep-
tion of a thing is based on the pre-phenomenological unity of the
time-constituting consciousness.
Anticipations of perceptual appearances move towards fulfil-
ment, imposing a certain direction to the course of perception.
But the possibility of an incomplete givenness always remains open
and is a constitutive part of every perceptual process. The givenness
of an object is never complete since anticipations refer to possible
experiences which cannot all be verified in actuality. In this sense,
every perception is also an interpretation, and creative activity in
relation to the presentational actuality, which leaves open further
possible fulfilment. On the other hand, though, if syntheses are
never completed, but continuous, we can affirm that there is no
singularity involved in perception. Indeed, every appearance is
grasped in relation to series of synthetical unities. Perception im-
poses thus a going-beyond of discrete elements, which are presented
only abstractly, as parts of fragmented unities. Phenomenologically
speaking, identification is that which integrates every potential sin-
gular element into a wider unity.
The telos of a thing-in-itself

As Husserl notices, in the synthetic givenness of objects, there
is also present, along the presentational actuality, a ‘goal-directed
intending’72, and a telos that shapes anticipations in relation to

the elapsed appearances. This ‘higher intention toward’73 is in fact
responsible for the unitary becoming of perception and for the syn-
thetic life of consciousness. The telos that guides every perceptual
activity is an ideal that also generates, when taken in a dogmatic
sense, the idea of a thing-in-itself, of a true being. Thus, the pos-
sibility of a full givenness, which would present the object as it is,
imposes the necessity to uncover the thing in its complete determi-
nations. But the idea of an absolute adequation does not point to a
faithful replica of reality since the thing-in-itself is presumptive and
derivative when confronted to the endless adumbrations. It is in
this sense that Husserl’s dictum, ‘what cannot be thought, cannot
be, what cannot be, cannot be thought’74, has to be understood.
So is the individuality of things a mere illusion, formed by the
teleological nature of perception? To this question, we have to an-
swer by stressing the relation of resemblance that exists between
the intentional object and its givenness. Indeed, Husserl maintains
a resembling rapport between, for instance, the colour of an ob-
ject and the colour as it is sensed by the subject. As he states in
Thing and Space, ‘certain types of physical data are bound… to
corresponding types of objective determinations’75. That is to say,
between the thing as it is and its phenomenal givenness there is
congruence, since the appearances are, as presentational, related to
the appearing thing. Additionally, if the total givenness of things
is never fulfilled, moments of the object given through perception
can attain adequacy. Indeed, ‘with respect to this or that moment
of the thing, ever more complete presentation can take place, and
that appears, in the directions of change taken at any time, to cul-
72 DR, pp. 95, 114.
73 DR, pp. 96, 114.
74 III LI, p. 44.
75 DR, pp. 46, 54.
minate in a best presentation, in an appearance, which needs no

further increase’76. Here, the distinction between moments and
pieces, which is developed in the Third Logical Investigation, is of
major importance insofar as maximum givenness of a moment im-
plies, in its nature, an adequation of a non-independent part of an
object. Thus, even if “complete” givenness is granted to moments
of a thing, the process of total fulfilment is never ended, but re-
mains incomplete. Nonetheless, the question remains as to the pos-
sibility of validating the resemblance linking the lived experienced
of an ego to the things in the world. As Husserl points out, since
these experiences ‘are not the things (which are, on the contrary,
supposed to exist outside the subject), there must be inferences
which induce and justify our assuming the things outside’77. Or,
‘how does the reality of what is subjective guarantee a merely hy-
pothetically assumed reality of what is objective, of what lies in the
outer world?’78. These questions have to be rejected as they alter the
genuine purpose of phenomenology, which is not directed towards
reality, but only towards modes of givenness. The aim of the reduc-
tion is precisely to invalidate the legitimacy of such interrogations
and to nullify claims to real existence. The true being-in-itself is
not a concern for phenomenology. Thus, all ontological commit-
ments to real objects have to be annulled as speculative. At the
same time, the singular considered in its relation to the reality of
unique objects also has to be rejected because phenomenology is
not an exploration of what things are, but rather an investigation
of how objects appear to a constitutive ego. So, the singularity of
reality will not be considered as a valid argument within the phe-
nomenology of a thing-constitution.
76 DR, pp. 103, 123.
77 DR, pp. 117, 140.
78 DR, pp. 117, 140.
As we have previously seen, the perceptual appearances of a

thing are teleologically directed towards absolute givenness. But
the interests that determine the course of perception are dictated,
in the everyday life, by particular standpoints, which are generically
formed by previous, elapsed phases. At the same time, in relation
to a given object, there are different possible appearances that can
be developed. But these appearances are not chaotically presented
in potential infinite series. There is a certain unity in the perceptual
activity which marks the continuity of syntheses. To quote Husserl
again, ‘the unity of a possible perceptual synthesis in general, into
which the relevant appearance is supposed to be ordered, prescribes
a rule and law to the appearances that are possible in such a uni-
ty’79. However, there is a certain aporetic dimension with regard to
the way in which appearances appear as presentational moments of
a given object. Indeed, the unity of a perceptual process is in place
when the series of appearances are presented. At the same time,
whereas the unity might be grounded on the resemblance with the
perceived thing in itself, it seems that it is only at the level of the
phenomenal that unity can be accepted as certain.
Furthermore, we know that the genesis of appearances is deter-
mined by the kinetic possibilities of the living body. However, in
the experiential flux of each individual ego, the unveiling of things
in relation to this ego-centre can be very different. Once again, the
perceptual object has to be related to the question of transcenden-
tal individuality. Genetically, perception is a stratified experience,
which can vary with regard to its presentational aspects. In its nex-
us of appearances, every perception has an ideal directness, which
is dependent on the specific constitution of each subject. Whereas
the complete determination of an object is an ideal, the direction
of this determination is acquired experientially by each individual.
79 DR, pp. 108, 130.
The anticipations of new determinations are, thus, formed in the

context of a stratified progression of the life of the ego.
c. The living body

The syntheses of the living body
The presentational appearances of a thing depend, thus, on
the position of the perceiving subject and its kinetic condition.
Movement influences the manner in which objects appear and ev-
ery motion is to be related to the living body. Furthermore, a syn-
thetic function is to be established at this level insofar as the move-
ments of the ego’s living body are not distinguished as belonging
to independent parts with no connection between them. On the
contrary, the body itself functions as a synthetic nexus that unifies
movement of the eyes, with that of the head, or of the hands. There
is, thus, a certain continuity between the kinetic condition of the
living body and the appearing objects presented to the experienc-
ing objects. It is obvious, in this light, that the definition of rest, or
movement, with regard to objects in the world can be related only
to the givenness of things, and not to a so-called ‘objective’ reality.
Spatial orientation
For Husserl, the perception of every object is integrated into a
perceptual field, composed by co-meant or co-given objects in the
background. This aspect is related to the manner in which the expe-
riencing subject relates to space. Indeed, things that appear to each
perceiving subject are experienced in relation to the ‘here’80 of his
80 In DR Husserl opens a more detailed discussion about the location of the
living body in the perceived world. Accepting the hypothesis of an absolute
zero-point in the relational perceptions of things, Husserl seems, though,
living body. His bodily presence constitutes itself as the ‘zero-point’

of every spatial orientation. In this sense, the access to spatial things
is solely given to an incarnated subject, since embodiment is, indeed,
the condition that makes possible perceptual relations to things in
the world. But the living body is not a static reference point that con-
stitutes objects one-sidedly from the perspective of a non-changing
‘here’. On the contrary, it is its ability to move in space that ren-
ders the non-perceived, absent profiles of an object co-intended. The
bodily movement is, thus, the major aspect that relates the subject,
in its experience of space, to the constituting transcendence of an
object and its potential appearances. However, the ‘here’ of the liv-
ing body is not itself spatial insofar as it is still pre-objectified. In
this sense, we can assert that the living body does not have a loca-
tion in space, even if it constitutes the givenness of transcendence in
space. Nevertheless, the living body is also a physical thing that in-
teracts with the objectual world and is distinguished by other egos on
the ground of its appearance as an object in the world. However, as
Husserl emphasises, ‘its distinguishability and identifiability in space
for everyone … make not the slightest contribution to its being as ens
per se. As such it already has, in itself, its uniqueness’81.
Consequently, we can say that the living body comprises a spe-
cific ambivalence. Indeed, the things are given to the subject by
means of its subjective body. At the same time, however, the body is
an object in the world and has a specific location and kinetic condi-
tion in space. But for unveiling this dual nature of the living body
Husserl seems to suggest the necessary presence of another ego. So, if
to offer a significant pre-eminence to the visual perception when he asserts
that the absolute ‘here’, ‘this relational point is not the entire body but is
set within an unseen part of the body. It resides somewhere in the head, in
the eye or behind the eye’ (pp. 193, 227).
81 C, §62, p. 218.
‘the living body is primarily a thing like any other’82, it distinguishes

itself from the other objects insofar as it can recede from its own lo-
cation only in a limited sense (its parts remain attached to it even in
moving one of them). This means that the living body cannot change
its location with regard to itself in the same way that it is capable
to perform movement in relation to other objects. Furthermore, a
change in its kinaesthetic condition determines a modification of the
entire perceptual field, whereas the movement of other objects does
not bring forth the same type of modification. Thus, the movement
of the living body is not limited to parts of the kinaesthetic field, but
encompasses the global environment of objects.
Through the analysis of the living body, the particularity of the
transcendent objects has been connected to the constitutive efforts of
an ego. Thus, though we have started our inquiry into the thing-con-
stitution by focusing purely on its objective side, the requirements
imposed by a phenomenological description has obliged us to en-
large the sphere of investigation to include the role of the constitutive
ego in the process of a thing-formation. The next step will be to pur-
sue the way in which a generic dimension is inescapably correlated
to thing-constitution. So, is repetition to be unveiled even within the
intentional disclosure of transcendent particulars?
d. The role of association in thing-constitution

As we have noticed in the course of our investigations, the sin-
gularity of things in the objective world does not have any valid
claim for phenomenology. External objects as such are never con-
stituted as more than mere dogmatic presuppositions and the only
phenomenological givenness that remains, in this case, is the im-
manent object, the thing as it is intentionally meant by the tran-
82 DR, pp. 241, 280.
scendental ego. Throughout the stream of experiences, the subject

forms continuous series of syntheses and unities that persist in spite
of changes within the field of presenting moments. There is an
endless connection between data so that identity, or differentia-
tion, with regard to previous appearances is preserved. The mode
of consciousness that operates in the grasping of the objective field
is coincidence. Fragmentability seems, thus, to be derivative and
abstractive because the presentational appearances are given in or-
dered manifolds, by means of associations.
The formation of associative unities

There are, in fact, different associative unities which are formed
between things, or aspects of perceptual objects. Thus, we can say
that associations rise and die; they do not pre-exist in the flow of
experience, but are rather based on confirmatory experiences. It
is, in this sense, possible to conceive a weakening of associative
connections between two experiences. Association is reinforced by
repeated confirmation: ‘to be given together, to be given together
repeatedly in one consciousness, creates a sort of unity whose force
increases with the number of cases of the givenness together in one
consciousness’83. But the opposite can also occur: ‘the disappoint-
ing of associative intentions weakens their motivating and unifying
force and in conflict posits a counter force opposed to them’84.
Nevertheless, there are general associations that do not perish in
the course of a deceptive experience. These are rooted in space, as
lived location, and in the temporality of the experiencing ego. They
make unification, or resemblance between appearing things, pos-
sible and, from this perspective, all synthetic series are grounded on
83 DR, pp. 150, 178.
84 DR, pp. 150, 178.
them. The ultimate associative bases for all connections are, there-
fore, the temporal and spatial locations of the experiencing ego.
The manifold of different appearances is integrated into this found-
ing generality, which renders the associative relations between dif-
ferent aspects possible.
However, there is a certain ambiguity in the manner in which as-
sociations are constructed on the basis of the location of ego’s living
body and its temporal genesis. That is to say, if the spatio-temporal
living body generates distinctions and identifications, it is also true
that it can only be auto-constituted by means of transcendent data.
In other words, if phenomenal difference is formed in relation to the
general unities of space and time, it is equally true that temporality
and spatiality can be operative in their functions only through the
presence of transcendence. Therefore, the kinaesthetic and temporal
circumstances that determine the manifold of appearances are only
possible because of the continuous experiencing of things.
Becoming otherwise
Another aspect that has to be stressed here is the fact that, if
the presentation of an object always presupposes associative sim-
ilarities in relation to previous experiences, the appearances are
not to be established as identical, or totally dissimilar. The con-
stitution of a thing as ‘what is identical in change’85, is linked to
this idea. In the qualitative determinations of an object, there are
continuous modifications, the case of an unmodified thing be-
ing an ideal situation which is not confirmed in actual percep-
tion. Indeed, an object ‘is identical only in constantly becoming
otherwise, in changing’86. But these changes always presuppose
85 DR, pp. 228, 264.
86 DR, pp. 247, 286.
that something remains completely unmodified in a particular per-

ceptual phase: e.g. the colour-modification occurs while the form
remains unchanged, etc. Moreover, in the constitution of things, the
expectation of non-change seems to be primordial. In fact, if change
is constitutive of the nature of things, it is also important to note
that modifications are always grounded in unity, in a constant re-de-
termination of an object-identity in agreement with actual changes.
Thus, dissimilarities, or disappointments with regard to confirma-
tory expectations, are subsequent to a consciousness of the same that
operates at the lowest level of constitution. As Husserl states, ‘change
means becoming otherwise, and the “otherwise” refers back to a “not
otherwise” or, resolving the double negation, to a remaining identi-
cal’87. In this sense, we can affirm that change always refers to being
the same insofar as modifications from the norm are connected to
identity-expectations. To quote Husserl again, ‘something or other
in general must maintain a unity through continuity. Somewhere or
other, continuity must reside in the phenomenon’88. Once again, the
synthetic nature of thing-constitution invalidates singularity within
the genetic becoming of the same thing, or with regard to environ-
ments of other co-present objects. To conclude, ‘we see here that ab-
solute being-otherwise in any respect is just as countersensical as ab-
solute indeterminateness’89. The synthetic consciousness of identity
is, thus, primordial in thing-constitution and renders impossible sin-
gular appearings. Individuality is founded on identity-constitution,
on sameness and, on change within identity. But the synthetic move-
ment organising the field of perceptual activity implies that absolute
dissimilarity is impossible from a phenomenological perspective. The
absolute other is never radically other, but has already synthetically
been integrated into a higher-level unification.
87 DR, pp. 235, 272.
88 DR, pp. 236, 273.
89 DR, pp. 82, 97.
Particularity vs. singularity

To conclude, we can assert that transcendent particularity is
based on a repetitive genesis that is correlated to the auto-con-
stitution of the experiencing ego. In this sense, the singular has
to be, once more, invalidated because of the synthetic nature of
the constitution involved in manifold-unities. The result of the
investigations that have been deployed in this chapter suggests
that, from a phenomenological perspective, our experiences are al-
ways synthetic and refer to more profound layers of constitution.
Eventually, the geneses of transcendent objects, as well as the auto-
formation of individuals within a transcendental realm, return to
the ultimate stratum of sense-data. But, as we have showed in our
first chapter, the temporal flowing that affects this original stratum
generates an aporetic account: the unmediated and non-synthetic
elements are based on more primitive data, which phenomenol-
ogy cannot expose. The singular has to be accounted for in non-
temporal geneses, and through a disregard for habitual historicity.
However, the particular, as a unique cluster of characteristics, is
never singular, but always already repetitive, and synthetic. In the
hierarchy of parts and wholes, the ultimate elements are never ul-
timate (phenomenology cannot offer an explanation of its origin),
and the manifold-wholes overlap each other. The commonality of
particularity cannot, therefore, corroborate a phenomenology of
the singular. Husserl’s emphasis on genesis is grounded on the gen-
erality of habits, and on a habitual type of repetition. A recupera-
tive memory cannot give rise to a veritable singularity. In Husserl’s
genesis of particularity, repetition cannot produce singularities. In
our next chapter, we will have to direct our attention to the most
encompassing wholes. If the hyletic data and the manifold-unities
cannot explain singularity, are the time-constituting flow and the
total-space different in this respect? Let us scrutinise this possibil-
ity by looking first at the most fundamental structure of temporal

constitution. As we have already observed, the genesis has so far
been an important obstacle in the phenomenological constitution
of singularity. Affecting the transcendental individuals, as described
by means of a genetic phenomenology, and the formation of tran-
scendent unities, temporality will have to be taken to the primitive
source of its constitution. Following this examination, the second
part of the third chapter will attempt to show in what sense the
world as total-space can be considered as singular. So, are the ulti-
mate wholes singular?
CHAPTER IV
THE PRE-PHENOMENAL:
SINGULARITY AS UNIQUENESS
1. The anonymous pre-ego: time-constituting consciousness

An ego-less sleep
In his early work, Levinas associates existence with the imper-
sonal reality of the il y a, a ‘heavy atmosphere belonging to no
one, universal’1. This anonymous presence is the nocturnal pres-
ence of a horrifying absence, formless and indefinite. Relating the
indeterminacy of existence to the obsessive dimension of noctur-
nal vigilance, of insomnia, Levinas suggests that this watchfulness
is not conscious attentiveness, or the result of a liberated existent
that controls its reactions. Rather, it is the exhausting presence of
anonymity that invades existent’s nocturnal experience. Watching
the void of the night which it cannot suspend, the existent is eradi-
cated by the impersonal being. ‘There is a nocturnal space, but it is
no longer empty space, the transparency which both separates us
from things and gives us access to them, by which they are given.
Darkness fills it like a content; it is full, but full of the nothingness
of everything’2. Striving against the paralysing existence is the ef-
fort to constitute a self-identical existent, which would be equiva-
lent to a sleeping subject.
The same distinction is made by Husserl3, which, in a signifi-
cant way reproduces the awareness of a sleepy ego, but changes the
1 EE, p. 58.
2 EE, p. 58.
3 Id II, pp. 114, 107.
valence of anonymity. The active ego is the subject by definition,

the symbol of the dominance of reflection. In contrast to this ‘alert’
ego, there is also a ‘dull’ or ‘egoless’ subject – a subject that sleeps
in obscurity. However, anonymity is, for Husserl, not the realm of
the universal, or of repetition, but it is rather the event, the stream
of time outside time.
The examination of inner time-consciousness is crucial for the
comprehension of the primal singularity of a pre-egological ano-
nymity. By focusing on pre-objectified subjectivity, we open the
way to the ‘lowest level’ of constitution. Indeed, as Husserl re-
marks in Experience and Judgement, ‘the operations of the synthesis
in internal time-consciousness’ are presupposed by all subsequent
constitutive syntheses4. Or, stated differently, the consciousness of
internal-time is ‘the fundamental form… that makes all other syn-
theses of consciousness possible’5. Furthermore, the ego-less flow-
ing does not bear identification in terms of objectification and,
from this perspective, it is immediate. But the ‘lack’ of an ego
should not be interpreted here in a misleading way as implying the
absence of a subjective affection, since there is no sense of being
affected which is not related to the being of a subject. One cannot
be affected by anything unless there is a dimension of unreflective
self-reference that constitutes the ground for all further relations
to a non-subjective pole. In this sense, the expression “ego-less”
does not stand for the absence of a subject, but rather points to a
dimension of primitive receptivity, which is not yet recuperated at
the level of reflection. When Husserl mentions a pre-egoic ano-
nymity, this is to be interpreted as an indication of a pre-thematic
self-reference. Consequently, the anonymous passive affection of
the subject does not encompass a pre-subjective constitution, but
4 EJ, § 16, p. 73.
5 CM, pp. 43, 81.
THE PRE-PHENOMENAL 139
characterises the grounding of a pre-reflective subjective life that

has not yet objectified itself in self-representation. In a significant
way, time-consciousness is the most important aspect characteris-
ing the structure of consciousness in Husserl’s phenomenology, as
it discloses the centrality of immanent subjectivity. That is to say,
in the analyses of time-consciousness, the primitive structure of
subjectivity finds a specific determination as an unchanging form,
a singular and non-representational stream.
The three levels of temporal constitution

Husserl situates the consciousness of time within a sphere of con-
stitution which is not posited in time. The time-constituting con-
sciousness is ‘absolute subjectivity’, given in non-perspectival self-
appearance, and distinct from the temporal genesis of internal ob-
jects. Beside this particular aspect, the specific connection between
the absolute flow, where time appears but which is non-temporal in
itself, and its immanent contents, reflects the originality of Husserl’s
thought. Thus, the pre-phenomenal time-constituting consciousness
is a pre-condition with respect to the constituted temporal objects.
The analysis of the relation between absolute consciousness,
or time-constituting phenomena, and immanent contents (data
of sensation, appearances, acts) becomes an essential point in the
consideration of the primitive structure of subjectivity. At the same
time, the distinction between temporal objects and immanent per-
ceptive acts, which belong to the level of inner time, is emphasised
by Husserl throughout his considerations on time-consciousness
as a fundamental point of his phenomenological analyses. As he
clearly states, ‘it is certainly evident that the perception of a tem-
poral object itself has temporality, that the perception of the du-
ration itself presupposes the duration of the perception, that the
perception of any temporal form itself has its temporal form’6. In

other words, the external ‘objective’ time is given within the imma-
nent temporality of the second level. However, in addition to these
two distinctive levels, Husserl indicates a third level of temporal
constitution: the absolute time-constituting flow of consciousness,
which constitutes both the immanent temporality of the intending
acts, data of sensation and appearances and, through it, the tran-
scendent temporality of external objects. The immanent levels of
time-consciousness present ‘consciousness both as a temporalising
[zeitigend] “absolute subjectivity” constituting all temporal appear-
ances and, in its self-appearance or self-temporalisation, as a con-
stituted flow of consciousness’7. Thus, in a very profound manner,
Husserl introduces two immanent dimensions within conscious-
ness itself, one constitutive of the other, such that the constituting
level of temporality, absolute consciousness, is the deepest level of
temporal constitution. In this sense, the absolute flow constitutes
both the external flowing of transcendent objects and the imma-
nent unities in pre-empirical time. Yet, these three dimensions of
time-consciousness are interwoven: external objects, intended in
the world and appearing in worldly time, are constituted by means
of conscious processes, intending acts that form the immanent lev-
el of inner time, which is again temporalised by the absolute flow
of the time-constituting consciousness.
Triple intentionality
Husserl explains the essential structure of temporal experience
in accordance with Brentano’s triple intentionality. The temporal
object that takes at the beginning the now mode of appearance,
6 PCIT, pp. 24, 23.
7 Rudolf Bernet, Iso Kern & Eduard Marbach, An Introduction to Husserlian Phe-
nomenology, Evanston, Illinois, Northwestern University Press, 1999, p. 101.
recedes into the past but, in sinking back into ‘emptiness’, is still
intended, in a duration unity, as ‘retention’. There is, thus, conti-
nuity within the modes of appearance which form the temporal
flow. Retention and protention, as different intentional correlates
of temporal phases, complement the primal sensation. The manner
in which the temporal object appears is continuously modified as
it sinks back into an ever more remote past, with every new gen-
erative now-point. The temporal object is given to consciousness
in this continual flow. The temporal flow itself is constituted by
its intending structure: the present now-point is intended differ-
ently than the elapsed points. In this sense, the more distant phases
are intended in retentions and with decreasing clarity to the point
where they sink into obscurity and can only be grasped by an empty
retentional consciousness. The temporal modes of appearance that
are distant with regard to the generative now-points present an ever
more contracted perspective as the phases recede into the past. In
fact, as Husserl observes, this temporal perspective contracts itself
until it becomes obscure8.
The ‘being-together’ and the ‘being-all-at-once’

Accordingly, the consciousness of the now-phase is just a mode
of appearance of transcendent objects and their intending acts and,
as such, it is obscured and does not appear in its pure form but only
as a temporal dimension that brings forth the present appearing to-
gether with what appears. In this context, Husserl states that simul-
taneity of primal sensations is possible precisely on the ground of
the openness and uniqueness of the present temporal form: ‘there
rather exist something like a common form of the now, a universal
8 PCIT, pp. 28, 27.
and perfect likeness in the mode of the flowing’9. Consequently,

the now is a temporal form in which several primal impressions
can occur, a mode of appearing that cannot be seized by certain
impressional contents, caught in their flowing away. The formal
dimension of the now is thus defined by two significant charac-
teristics: ‘the “being-together” [Zusammen]’ and ‘the “being-all-at-
once” [Zugleich]’10 of the primal impressions. There is, therefore,
in the present perceptual consciousness, a moment of indecision,
and a play of interaction between several impressions that pres-
ent themselves as together and, at the same time, as distinct from
one another11. Retentional consciousness conforms to the same
law that binds the actual primal sensations into a mode of being-
together, a unique ensemble. Indeed, the modified primal sensa-
tions, flowing away through different modes of consciousness with
the continuously emerging new primal sensations, retain the mode
of being-together and complement simultaneity with a structure
of succession. As Husserl points out, ‘what is a being-together as
an ensemble of primal sensations remains a being-together in the
9 PCIT, pp. 81, 77.
10 PCIT, pp. 81, 77.
11 Referring to appendixes from ASAP, M. Richir (‘Synthèse passive et tem-
poralisation/spatialisation’, Husserl, E. Escoubas & M. Richir eds, Greno-
ble, Millon, 1989, pp. 9-41) unveils the aporia caused by this stratification
of the present. Thus, the multiplicity and heterogeneity of present points
presupposes the operations of a passive synthesis, which unifies these non-
identical elements. It means that there is a temporal absence in the form
through which time is accomplished, and that simultaneity is built as a
result of a proto-spatialisation. The conclusion is that ‘there is not, except
as an abstraction, temporalisation without spatialisation’ (p.27). Further-
more, Husserl is obliged to accept that passive syntheses have, in this case,
an autonomous status as far as temporality is concerned. The discontinuity
of the present implies that time is not the ultimate synthesis. As a result,
Richir concludes that Husserl’s conception of temporality cannot be com-
prehended only on phenomenological bases.
mode of having elapsed’12. Yet, between retention and the now-in-

tending consciousness there is also a mode of being-together that is
not simultaneity because these modes of consciousness are not in-
serted in the objective or immanent time, but form a non-temporal
sequence that is identical to the absolute flow of internal conscious-
ness. These time-constituting phenomena form therefore a flow of
succession, which is unique and cannot be described in terms used
for the constituted temporal unities. Husserl underlines this aspect
as a major point in the understanding of the fundamental ground
of subjectivity:
this flow is something we speak of in conformity with what is
constituted, but is not “something in objective time”. It is abso-
lute subjectivity and has the absolute properties of something to
be designed metaphorically as “flow”; of something that origi-
nates in a point of actuality, in a primal source-point, “the now”
and so on... For all of this we lack names13.
The horizontal and the transverse intentionality

Non-temporal in itself14 and escaping the order of givenness in
objective or immanent time, the time-constituting flow refutes the
infinite regress15 implied by the hypothesis of a temporal time-con-
12 PCIT, pp. 82, 77.
13 PCIT, pp. 79, 75.
14 Cf. for instance Appendix VI, PCIT, where Husserl calls the time-consti-
tuting flow ‘the absolute timeless consciousness’ (pp. 117, 112). He also un-
derlines once more the idea that the flow is not an enduring object because
‘there is no duration in the original flow’ (pp. 118, 113).
15 Cf. PCIT, No. 50, pp. 344, 332 where Husserl notices that the idea of
having a memory of the motion of the flow itself is absurd and has to be
rejected as it introduces regress ad infinitum: ‘are we not threatened with an
infinite regress here?’
sciousness. Husserl emphasises the non-temporality of the absolute

subjectivity as a primordial basis of the analyses on time: ‘The flow
of the modes of consciousness is not a process; the consciousness of
the now is not itself now’16. That is to say, the flow of experiencing
immanent temporal objects is not a part of a series of these imma-
nent objects, or, in other words, the experiencing of the object as
now is not itself now but rather occurs “outside” time. In addition,
he further on continues: ‘retention, recollection, perception, etc., are
non-temporal; that is to say, nothing in the immanent time’17.
Lacking names, the pre-egological flow is anonymous and chang-
es without being altered or constituted as a flow in a manner similar
to that of the temporal series. It forms an ‘all-inclusive unity’ where
different series of primal impressions are integrated. In other words,
‘we find a single flow that breaks down into many flows, but this mul-
titude nevertheless has a kind of unity that permits and requires us to
speak of one flow’18. This unity is then discernible at the level of each
mode of consciousness, making possible therefore the existence of si-
multaneous primal sensations. It is interesting to notice that the diver-
sity created in an ensemble of actually present sensations is originated
in the distinct content of these impressions. It is, thus, the impres-
sional dimension itself that individualises, in a group of simultaneous
sensations, which take the now-mode of appearing, different tempo-
ral series. That is, ‘in a group of primal sensations, primal sensation
is distinguished from primal sensation by means of content’19. While
the identical modal form explains the being-together of impressions,
it is indeed at the impressional level of constitution that difference
16 PCIT, No. 50, pp. 345, 333.
17 PCIT, No. 50, pp. 346, 334. It is important to observe that ‘sensation’ is
here equivalent to ‘sensing’, the experiencing of sensuous contents that are
immanent temporal objects, and not to the sensuous content itself.
18 PCIT, pp. 81, 76.
19 PCIT, pp. 82, 78.
is introduced in the flow. That is to say, if the anonymous form is

not synthetic in relation to its own constitution, it becomes a unify-
ing synthesis when it constitutes temporal experience. In contrast to
simultaneity, succession is given in the continuity that exists between
different running-off modes of consciousness that accommodate ev-
er-new groups of sensations. As stated earlier, the time-constituting
flow is an ultimate unity that comprises the immanent temporal ob-
jects, but also their experiencing. Husserl stresses at this point the
interdependence of the constitution of these two sides of the unity of
the flux. That is, ‘there is one, unique flow of consciousness in which
both the unity of the tone in immanent time and the unity of the flow
of consciousness itself becomes constituted at once’20. The internal
consciousness is therefore not an ultimate stratum that presents itself
as independent and separated from the immanent temporal series.
There is a permanent inseparability which is revealed by Husserl in
the analysis of the double (horizontal and transverse) intentionality
of retention. Commenting on this aspect, Husserl observes that in
the continuous flowing away of a tone-content, the retentional con-
sciousness is directed to the primal impression of the tone together
with the tone itself. To quote Husserl on this matter, ‘retention is also
retention of the elapsed tone-retention’21 so that in the progression
of the flow we can grasp a continuity of retentional adumbrations
that form the horizontal intentionality of the self-coinciding flow.
Thus, if we consider the enduring temporal object (a phase of the
flow) and the constitution of its identity through temporal phases
(transverse intentionality — Querintentionalität), we have to direct
our attention towards its modifications from primal impression to the
continuous series of retentions. However, if we want to comprehend
the way in which the unity of the absolute flow is self-constituted,
20 PCIT, pp. 84, 80.
21 PCIT, pp. 85, 81.
we have to shift our attention from the immanent temporal object

to the modification of the primal impression and of the retentional
‘being-all-at-once’. The absolute flow of consciousness appears to it-
self by means of horizontal intentionality (Längsintentionalität) as
exceeding the particular flowing away of a specific immanent con-
tent. But time-constituting consciousness could not appear to itself
as a constituted unity, through a continuum of retentional modi-
fications, without ‘being together’ with the experiencing of an im-
manent object. Internal time-consciousness can be abstracted from
the enduring temporal objects only in reflection. As Husserl states,
‘two inseparably united intentionalities, requiring one another like
two sides of one and the same thing, are interwoven with each other
in the one, unique flow of consciousness’22. Further on, he maintains
the same idea: ‘this pre-phenomenal, pre-immanent temporality be-
comes constituted intentionally as the form of the time-constituting
consciousness and in it itself’23. Thus, the flow is characterised as
self-appearance through a dimension of interdependence24 between
constituting and constituted “phenomena”.
The singularity of the flow of flows

However, even if in abstractive reflection25, the time-constitut-
ing flow can be isolated from the temporality of immanent objects,
22 PCIT, pp. 87, 83.
23 PCIT, pp. 88, 83.
24 In ‘Origine du temps et temps originaire chez Husserl et Heidegger’ (Re-
vue philosophique de Louvain, 85, 1987, pp. 499-521) R. Bernet accurately
observes that this interdependency is comparable to Merleau-Ponty’s no-
tion of reversibility. This implies that, far from being only terminologically
depended on the constituted phenomena, the time-constituting flow is co-
constituted and cannot be an autonomous and absolute origin.
25 On the question of the distinction between reflection, the turn of attention
and thematising, Husserl is again ambiguous. Thus, if sometimes reflec-
in reality inner consciousness is dependent on immanent contents.

As Husserl reveals it, the flow has a formal structure and is better
defined as ‘a flow of flows’26, each constituted as a unity, which has
again the same form. The absolute time-constituting flow is a stable
form which manifests the pre-reflective and fundamental levels of
subjective life. Though we distinguish reflectively different abstrac-
tive parts or formal regularities within the flow, time-constituting
consciousness is, in reality, not a separated or empty structure. To
quote Husserl on this matter, the ‘constant form is always filled
anew by “content”, but the content is certainly not something in-
troduced into the form from without. On the contrary, it is deter-
mined through the form of regularity- only in such a way that this
regularity does not alone determine the concretum’27.
Viewed in light of the previous analyses, the pre-egological form
of subjectivity seems to be the perfect solution to the quest for sin-
gularity in phenomenology. Indeed, situated at a level where the
synthetic bringing together cannot be applied, time-consciousness
is the pre-reflective centre where transcendental reduction has to
capitulate. However, in a sense, we can affirm that Husserl is dog-
matic when it comes to establishing the non-temporal flow which
conditions experience. Indeed, the transcendental evidence that he
can bring in favour of the time-constituting form is contradictory
and abstract. That is the reason why the reduction has a marginal
role in the time-lectures. In fact, the primitive consciousness that
Husserl constructs in relation to the threefold form of the flow
has a rather deductive characteristic. Being at the beginning ori-
tion and attentive experience are considered to be synonymous (Cf. e.g.,
Appendix XII, PCIT, pp. 132, 129), a difference has to be introduced with
regard to reflection as based on focal attention, and a non-reflective mar-
ginal attention.
26 PCIT, pp. 303, 292.
27 PCIT, pp. 118, 114.
ented towards the relation between transcendent objects and their

immanent experience, Husserl completely ignores the existence of
an absolute form involved in time-constitution. But, realising that
experience itself is temporal, Husserl attempts to explain its imma-
nent identity from a different perspective. Accordingly, he intro-
duces the double structure of the immanent and, with it, the ab-
solute and ultimate consciousness which constitutes the temporal
and unitary experience. But, as J. J. Brough notices, Husserl ‘never
directly justifies the difference [between the constitutive flow and
the constituted immanent temporality] on descriptive grounds’28.
Furthermore, he fails to ‘explain how the awareness of the absolute
flow itself is constituted – and some explanation must be forth-
coming if the talk of an absolute flow is to be justified’29. The prob-
lem underlined here is, in reality, to be directed against the limi-
tations of the phenomenological method itself and its descriptive
means. If the introduction of absolute consciousness is to solve the
question of self-reference from a non-reflective perspective, then
the ultimate flow is not an arbitrary decision. But phenomeno-
logical evidence lacks on this matter and Husserl himself qualifies
the ultimate consciousness as being pre-phenomenal, impossible to
be named. Represented by means of an objectifying terminology,
the absolute consciousness does not have a temporal genesis and
cannot be recollected by reflection. There is, thus, at this point of
the discussion the acknowledgement of singularity in the form of
a pre-reflective subjectivity, but phenomenology itself is put into
question as regards its methodological self-evidence30. Descriptive
28 J. J. Brough, ‘The Emergence of an Absolute Consciousness in Husserl’s
Early Writings on Time-Consciousness’, (Husserl. Expositions and Apprais-
als, F. A.Elliston & P. McCormick eds., pp. 83-101), p. 94. Also in Man
and the World, vol. 5, no.3, 1972, pp. 298-326.
29 J. J. Brought, ‘The Emergence of an Absolute Consciousness in Husserl’s
Early Writings on Time-Consciousness’, p. 95.
30 Developing Fink’s idea of a meontic thinking, R. Bruzina (‘The Transcen-
thought annuls itself (and this is the main openness to meta-critical

self-reference), yet not to reconstruct a new reflective grasp but to
express its confined authority.
The gift of the pre-phenomenal

The time-constituting consciousness reveals a deep aporetic di-
mension in the structure of the phenomenological argumentation31.
Indeed, the form of the flow that constitutes temporal phenomena is
impossible to be seized in accordance with the imperative of a faith-
ful description, since the time-constituting stream is the one that
conditions the linguistic appropriations of phenomenological data.
At the same time, the phenomenal field is rooted in the pre-temporal
flow, but it cannot encompass its source. That is to say, the time-
constituting form is non-experiential, whereas phenomenology is by
dental Theory of Method in Phenomenology; the Meontic and Decon-
struction’, Husserl Studies, 14, 1997, pp. 75-94) argues that the proto-tem-
poral flow can be approached only in the light of the reciprocity established
between the originated and the originating. Similar to Derrida’s strategy,
Fink’s ideas permit us to acknowledge the ‘ontifying’ characteristic of a
phenomenological explanation of the origin, and also to perceive its con-
ceptual limits. To sum up, the meontic methodology is based on the si-
multaneity of affirmation and of its annulling. It is important to note that
Levinas’s idea of a said that unsays itself in order to be faithful to the Saying
responds to the same need of constructing a meta-critical phenomenology.
It seems, thus, that the ultimate explanation in phenomenology can only
be a continuous self-deconstruction.
31 Cf. F. D. Sebbah, L’ épreuve de la limite, where he notes that ‘turning towards
time means turning towards this monstrous exigency that conscience has to
give birth to itself out of itself’. In this sense, bringing together Ur and Selbst,
phenomenology produces a conceptual malformation insofar as it is obliged
to encompass, at the same time, finitude and infinitude. As Sebbah remarks
‘this is effectively and manifestly the hybris of a phenomenology of time: if
consciousness lived itself as finite, there would be no hybris, no more than if
it lived itself absolutely as absolute; the hybris emerges when it attempts, as
absolute, to grasp absolutely the finitude that it also is’ (p. 88).
definition based on a close examination of the structures of experi-

ence. Thus, the anonymous flow is a postulate, a non-temporal and
abstractive field. If it is true that the time-constituting consciousness
is non-synthetic and singular in its essence, it is also significant that
phenomenological proofs for accepting it are missing.
If the absolute flow is to be apprehended reflectively, it is only at
the level of ego’s living experience and its immanent temporality that
reflection is possible. Similar to the assumption of an identical ego
as substrate of habitualities, an ultimate stream can be postulated in
relation to the constitution of immanent acts. Indeed, ‘as this iden-
tical, numerically one, ego, it itself belongs to “its own” stream of
lived experience, which is constituted as a unity of endless immanent
time. The one pure ego is constituted as a unity in relation to this
unity of the stream’32. If this unity is to be singular, as the danger of
an infinite regression requires, then the absolute time-constituting
consciousness has to be non-temporal and pre-phenomenal33.
32 Id II, pp. 119, 112.
33 We can say that the core of the difficulties related to time-constituting
consciousness refers back to Husserl’s emphasis on the perceptual aspect
of retention. Perception, which gives the intentional object in person, is
ambiguously used to point to both primal impression and its retentional
moment. In this sense, through this extension of the definition of percep-
tion, retention and the primal impression are brought under a common
denominator. This skilful way out of the impasse is, thus, based on the
commonality of a term. The same strategy is used to solve the duality be-
tween the pre-thematic and the thematic. As reflection, which represents
the mode par excellence of a phenomenological investigation, is made pos-
sible only on the base of a retentional mode, it is implied that reflection
has to operate on the givenness of an a priori. The immediate acquaintance
with an intentional object is ‘mediated’ by a retentional phase. Thus, by
admitting a retentional perception Husserl avoids solving the issue of the
forever refusal of origin in phenomenology. The commonality of a term
does not, however, solve the difference between a pre-phenomenal origin
and what it constitutes in the realm of the phenomenal.
To a certain extent, we can say that the question of time, in

Husserl’s phenomenology, resembles, to use Derrida’s description,
the impossibility of the gift. Indeed, time-consciousness is the non-
phenomenal in which everything phenomenal manifests itself, or
appears. Like the gift, time is an impossibility, the refusal of phe-
nomenality that attempts to give itself from within the given. Yet,
time-consciousness cannot be “presented” in the temporal flow as
a given, since it constitutes the origin of that which has to make
its appearing possible. Temporality, in its originality as absolute
stream, is the gift of the pre-phenomenal that has to inscribe it-
self into the sphere of the given. Originating the phenomenal flow
of living experiences, time-consciousness annuls itself when trans-
lated into the language of time. Nonetheless, even if only in meta-
phorical indications, time-consciousness can be brought to phe-
nomenological evidence only through a continuous reference to, and
as completely other than temporal phenomena. Indeed, to quote
Derrida, ‘for there to be a gift, there must be no reciprocity, return,
exchange, countergift, or debt’34. Stated differently, in order to be
absolute origin, the constituting order must not be “contaminated”
by any resemblance to the constituted order of phenomena. That is
to say, the constituted cannot turn into constitutive. Furthermore,
the constituted has to nullify any contract, or debt, towards the
absolute flow, dissociating itself radically from any attempt at iden-
tification. The gift is destroyed by restitution, or by the circulation
imposed by the giving back of something. Thus, forcing the time-
constituting consciousness to take the form of the phenomenal is a
restitution of the role of originator, and an endeavour to present a
countergift. But the constituting and the constituted exist as such
only in absolute separation and dissociation. This means that the
34 J. Derrida,Given Time: I Counterfeit Money (P. Kamuf trans.), Chicago &
London: University of Chicago Press, 1992, p.12.
absolute flow cannot ever be presented as constituting. To return to

the problematic of the gift,
it is thus necessary … that he [the donor] not recognise the gift
as gift. If he recognises it as gift, if the gift appears to him as such,
if the present is present to him as present, this simple recognition
suffices to annul the gift35.
In fact, recognition, or, in the case of the time-constituting

consciousness, inscription into the phenomenal means exchange
and non-separation. As we noted in the introduction, any form
of gratitude destroys the original. The phenomenal cannot mani-
fest the pre-phenomenal and recognise it as such; the constituted
can know nothing about it being constituted. The phenomenality
of the time-constituting consciousness is the impossible gift of a
pre-phenomenal givenness. Yet, it is not only the givenness of the
constituting origin that has to be attacked. It is also the intention-
al directness towards the absolute flow that is destructive, i.e. the
meaning of the gift as a gift: ‘the simple intention to give, insofar
as it carries the intentional meaning of the gift, suffices to make a
return payment to oneself ’36. As the gift, if there is any, refuses to
be reduced to it being intended, similarly, the constituting cannot
take part in the phenomenality of being meant. To sum up, the im-
possible condition of the gift is precisely that of temporality, which
has to be defined, in a paradoxical way, as that which distinguishes
itself from that which it brings to life. The origin, similar in its
non-temporal dimension to the non-flowing of the instant, cannot
become a present phenomenon.
Regarding the singularity of the absolute flow, we have dis-
covered that the tension between a pre-phenomenal form and its
phenomenological description has instituted a significant problem
35 Derrida, GT, p. 13.
36 Derrida, GT, p. 23.
within the imperative of givenness. As the absolute flow is the site

of singularity, the distance between a systematic and synthetic self,
and a non-reflective self-reference is unbridgeable from a phenom-
enological perspective. As a result, singularity is to be described in
a derivative and deductive procedure, which points to, rather than
encompasses, the singular as such. To reinforce these conclusions,
we can refer to one of Husserl’s statements. That is, ‘the unique
fact, the phenomenological singularity of the “this here”, is not the
goal of our constatations, thus it is not something like the phenom-
enon in the sense in which it is new, if we…merely have it given in
a repetition’37. In other words, the phenomenological approach to
singularity seems to be obstructed by its repetitive nature. In the
case of the absolute flow, which is, indeed, singular, insofar as it
does not enter into synthetic unities, and unique, phenomenology
steps into a constructive realm, or returns to analogies. So, the sin-
gularity of the anonymous flow is pre-phenomenal and cannot be
explained through a strict phenomenological description. However,
if Husserl does not properly answer the question of singularity with
regard to the non-temporal pole of the constitution, it is important
to examine also its transcendent correlate.
2. The world given as pre-given:

the question of pre-phenomenal spatiality
A singular world
In Ideas II, Husserl introduces a clear distinction between two
possible connotations of the term “subjective”. Firstly, the subjective
realm refers to the transcendental, and its activity, or passivity, in
relation to its own being. In the context of this determination, phe-
nomenology is oriented towards the issue of the self-constitution of
37 DR, pp. 10, 12.

subjectivity, which represents the locus, par excellence, of its endeav-

our to achieve absolute foundation. However, there is also a different
way of approaching subjectivity: namely, through its intentional life,
as the one that constitutes transcendence. In other words, “subjec-
tive” means here ‘being for the subject: what the ego has, consisting
of the material of sensation and the totality of objects constituted for
the subject in the course of its genesis’38. Husserl defines the inten-
tional ego as a subject that relates to objects as given, but not as re-
ally existing. In this sense, the distinction between real relations and
intentional constitution is a major one39.
In the sphere of transcendence, the world has a privileged status as
Husserl considers it to represent the transcendent par definition. At the
same time, Husserl stresses throughout his work the necessary unique-
ness of the world, as the fundamental earth-ground of our life. To the
remark that it would be possible to imagine the existence of a second
world, similar to ours, Husserl replies by pointing to the fact that two
earth-grounds exist only as fragments of a single, wider world.40 As it
refuses the possibility of a synthetic identity, it seems that the world
represents a good candidate in our search for a phenomenological sin-
gularity, for a pure singular realm that cannot enter classificatory rep-
resentation. Let us explore this idea in more detail.
a. The world of the natural attitude
The naturalistic vs. the personalistic attitude
Dividing, in Ideas II, the natural attitude into the naturalis-
tic and the personalistic attitudes41, Husserl stresses that the level
38 Id II, pp. 226, 215.
39 Id II, pp. 227, 215.
40 La Terre ne se meut pas (Manuscripts D17, D18 & D12 IV), trans. D.
Franck, D. Pradelle & J.F. Lavigne, Paris, Editions de Minuit, 1989, p.21.
41 Cf. C, App. III.
of constitution corresponding to the former is the material world

and men as animated objects of nature. In this attitude, the world
is an entity that can be experienced as physical nature. The ego-
subject itself is nothing more than an animated body for which
the physical world is foundational42. Exemplified by the natural
sciences, the naturalistic apprehension considers the world to be a
real material reference. Corresponding to this attitude, in Ideas I, is
the definition of the world as ‘the sum-total of objects of possible
experience and experiential cognition’43. The material world of the
appearing physical things, the world as real physical substratum
describes thus the first theoretical endeavour to grasp the world
in a thematic focus. Fundamental to this approach is the expe-
rience of objects, which represents the model of apperception of
the world. Nevertheless, even at this level, the natural sciences go
beyond the restrictive concept of the world as totality [Allheit] of
existing objects insofar as the postulate of a normative dimension
is introduced in the scientific practice. That is to say, objectivity,
as the ideal regulating science, expresses the imperative of securing
the existing world as ‘true being-in-itself ’. Consequently, the de-
scription of the world as mere totality of things is too narrow and
forces us to take into account the human being as cognitive factor
in the scientific process of understanding of the world. Hence, the
naturalistic attitude is to be supplemented by a personalistic one,
which is circumscribed by Husserl as the ‘world of spirit’44, thema-
tised by Geisteswissenschaften, human sciences (sciences of culture,
society etc). If the naturalistic attitude refers mainly to the totality
of physical nature, the personalistic one is to be delimited as
42 Id II, pp. 184, 174.
43 Id I, pp. 6, 8.
44 Cf. John J. Drummond, ‘The “Spiritual” World: The Personal, the Social,
and the Communal’ in Issues in Huserl’s Ideas II (T. Nenon & L. Embree
eds., Dordrecht, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1996), pp. 237-255.
the attitude we are always in when we live with one another, talk
to one another, shake hands with one another in greeting, or are
related to one another in love and aversion, in disposition and
action, in discourse and discussion45.
To render the distinction clearer, Husserl affirms that the natu-
ralistic attitude is scientific46, in the sense of being directed towards
objective reality, whereas the personalistic one is practical (‘in a
very broad sense, we can also denote the personal or motivational
attitude as the practical attitude’47). Corresponding to this descrip-
tion is the ‘surrounding world of life’ [Lebensumwelt] or the every-
day world [Alltagswelt]. In this respect, the spiritual world itself is
stratified: the first level is constituted by the surrounding world
(Umwelt) of the personal subject. The ‘pre-social subjectivity’ that
Husserl envisages is the personal ego - a ‘person who represents,
feels, evaluates, strives, and acts and who, in every such personal
act, stands in relation to something, to objects in his surrounding
world’48. Without being a mere physical reality, the surrounding
world is nevertheless related to actuality and naïve in its scope,
and this is precisely what inscribes it in the natural attitude. The
second level of constitution is the communal surrounding world,
i.e. the world of personal associations that relate the subject, in his
intentional lived experiences, to other egos. In relation to this type
of communal constitution of the world, Husserl stresses the fact
that ‘the subject finds consciously in his surrounding world not
only things…but also other subjects’49. Accordingly, the common
surrounding world represents the world of ‘mutual understanding’
based on shared practical and theoretical assumptions. However,
45 Id II, pp. 192, 183.
46 Id II, pp. 193, 183.
47 Id II, pp. 199, 190.
48 Id II, pp. 195, 185.
49 Id II, pp. 200, 190.
along with the world of the solitary subject (which is defined as

abstractive), and the communal world of personal associations,
Husserl stipulates the existence of a third level: the communicative
social surrounding world. If the associative world is rooted in the
understanding of the world of things as a common one50, sociality
imposes not only mutuality, but also communicative acts, in which
‘the Ego turns to others, and in which the ego is conscious of these
others towards which it is turning, and ones which, furthermore,
understand this turning, perhaps adjust their behaviour to it and
reciprocate’51. The social surrounding world is, therefore, the world
of teleological practices which guide communal becoming.
The practical vs. the theoretical attitude

To sum up, the world as ‘there for us’ or as ‘on hand’ describes
the natural attitude. Living naturally means in this context living
within the world as an undoubted datum, constantly relating to
the universe of the existent. The world is simply there for us, as a
world of sensible appearances, ready to be grasped through sensu-
ous perception, immediate background to all our feelings, actions,
objectifying acts. Existing in a practical manner, oriented by my
natural living, or as a universal ground of objectified cognition in
the realm of positive sciences, the world is always the basis of my
experience. At the same time our existence in the natural world is
dictated by interests, that is to say, we are never indifferent to the
things or persons that are part of our surroundings. We confront the
world from a vocational standpoint or, as Husserl formulates it, ‘this
world is there for me not only as a world of mere things, but also
with the same immediacy as a world of objects with values, a world of
50 Id II, pp. 204, 194.
51 Id II, pp. 204, 194.
goods, a practical world’52. Being in a certain attitude, we view situa-

tions in the light of specific interests. It is this particular dimension
that renders our natural attitude naïve and limited in its scope.
The surpassing of the practical mode of givenness of the world
inaugurates, as we have noticed previously, a different level within
the natural attitude. Indeed, the scientific attitude goes beyond the
naivety of the personal ‘home’ attitudes which guide our presence in
the world. The role of intersubjective relations is essential with regard
to this new level of the natural attitude. ‘All that which holds for me
myself holds, as I know, for all other human beings whom I find
present in my surroundings world’53. As Husserl states, the natural
world is objectively a common one but given in different ways de-
pending on the practical attitudes that orient us in the world. In this
sense, referring to the ideal of objectivity that gives rise to scientific
interests, Husserl considers in Ideas II54 the possibility of establish-
ing a solipsistic objective world. At the beginning, such a hypothesis
seems to be totally plausible: the subject is, in its isolation, able to
distinguish, for example, between the normal or optimal givenness
of a thing and anomalies that are caused by affected organs of per-
ception. As a result, within the perceptual world of the solipsistic
subject, a first distinction is elaborated as to the positing of objective
being. However, it is only when other human beings are present that
the world of the solipsistic subject (which is de facto impossible, ‘a
methodological abstraction’) can be validated and taken beyond the
realm of a pathological and hallucinatory perspective. It is in this
respect that an objective world is to be correlated to intersubjectivity
as that which ‘maintains its identity within the manifolds of appear-
ances belonging to a multiplicity of subjects’55.
52 Id I, pp. 53, 50.
53 Id I, pp. 55, 52.
54 Id II Section One, Ch. III e, f.
55 Id II, pp. 87, 82.
Consequently, though the actual perception of objects along with

their modes of being intended are different, the presence of other
persons ‘parenthesises’ the limited home attitude and opens up an
objective factual ground. This is the starting point of the natural sci-
entific attitude, characterised as an objective, theoretical stance, still
based on the assumption that the world is continuously there as an
actuality. From the intuitively given and pre-predicative56 straight-
forward naïve experience57 to the explicit, theoretical and predicative
co-experience of the world, the natural attitude comprises various
world-experiencing modes. In Ideas II, then, Husserl seems to accept
a precedence of the practical attitude with respect to the theoretical
one, though even the practical dispositions are representational and
cognitive. The perception of the world is first oriented by practical
value-characteristics, whether in a marginal or focused manner, and
only subsequently becomes objectified by a theoretical conscious-
ness, which forms the source of natural sciences.
With regard to the scientific attitude, it has to be noted that,
though opposed to the relative substance of our everyday opinions,
the natural sciences are still rooted in the contingent sphere of our
naïve home-worlds. Even formal sciences, which have a non-sensuous
basis and do not depend on particular sense-data, are products of our
56 In EJ, §14, Husserl blurs the distinction between pre-predicative and pre-
judgmental experience, suggesting the possibility of a pre-predicative ‘judge-
ment’. However, this is to be interpreted in accordance with statements from
Id II, where Husserl affirms that every perception has a doxic core insofar as
it is thing-positing. In this sense, the theoretical attitude is not the only one
to encompass a doxic experience. Indeed, the practical and valuing attitudes
have also a doxic basis. Yet, the doxic-theoretical attitude is an objectifying
one, an active attentive or thematic grasping (Id II Section One, Ch. 1, §2-4).
Consequently, the possibility of a pre-predicative, doxic, judgement-like per-
ception indicates pre-thematic, pre-theoretical experiences.
57 For a more extensive analysis of a phenomenological reflection on expe-
rience, cf. L. Landgrebe, ‘The Phenomenological Concept of Experience’
(Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 34/1, 1973), pp. 1-13.
natural stance and subject to revision58. It is not only the scientific

practice as such which transforms itself, but also the ideal core of for-
mal sciences59. As a result, the scientific attitude60 is part of the natural
stance and has to be suspended by a phenomenological reflection.
b. The progressive Cartesian epoché:

the world - ‘annulment’
The ‘residuum’ of the reduction
The need to acquire a descriptive scientific approach to world-
experience guides Husserl in his endeavour to construct a reduction
to the ultimate fundamental strata of constitution. One of the major
insights of a phenomenological description is to turn attention away
from mere referential poles of experience towards the intentional
contents of the transcendental ego. On the issue of world-constitu-
tion, Husserl recurrently stresses the independence of the transcen-
dental ego with regard to the world. Thus, in Ideas I, he asserts that
the transcendental ego is a ‘phenomenological residuum’, which is
58 Cf. Idea, pp. 21, 25: ‘The most rigorous forms of mathematics and math-
ematical natural science here have not the slightest advantage over any ac-
tual or alleged knowledge belonging to common experience’. Or PP, pp.
35, 48: ‘Properly speaking, even the a priori sciences … do not lose this
natural attitude’.
59 In a recent article (‘Why Husserl should have been a strong revisionist in math-
ematics’, Husserl Studies, 18/1, 2002, pp. 1-18), M. Van Atten argues that, de-
spite his insistence on the omnitemporality of mathematical objects, Husserl
authorises in fact a strong form of revisionism with regard to sciences. Ideal
objects are thus revisable and in need of a phenomenological examination.
60 Cf. S. Luft, ‘Husserl’s phenomenological discovery of the natural attitude’
(Continental Philosophy Review, 31/2, 1998, pp. 153-170), where he asserts that
‘the scientific attitude is merely an extrapolation, or abstraction, from a single
home attitude, in this case, the attitude of the Western thought’ (p. 163).
left after the performance of the phenomenological reduction61. In

contrast to the world of transcendent things, which is dependent on
consciousness, the immanent being of pure consciousness is absolute
and independent in its existence from the world of physical things.
In this sense, the world, determined in its spatiotemporal dimension,
comprises the human ego but not the transcendental one insofar as
the world represents, in the reduced attitude, only an intentional ob-
ject of my sense-bestowing consciousness, lacking ‘self-sufficiency in
virtue of its essence’62. Stated differently, ‘nature is possible only as an
intentional unity motivated in transcendentally pure consciousness
by immanental connections’63.
In contrast, consciousness is
in its essence independent of all worldly, all natural, being; nor
does it need any worldly being for its existence. The existence of a
nature cannot be the condition for the existence of consciousness,
since nature itself turns out to be a correlate of consciousness64.
To conclude the methodological separation that is operated

in the phenomenological attitude between absolute, transcenden-
tally pure consciousness and transcendent being, Husserl remarks
that ‘certainly a consciousness without an animated organism and,
paradoxical as it sounds, also without a psyche, a consciousness
which is not personal, is imaginable’65. Consciousness is therefore
absolute being, distinguished by a radical ontological difference
from transcendent being, which only becomes “manifested” in
consciousness.
61 Id I, pp. 113, 94.
62 Id I, pp. 113, 94.
63 Id I, pp. 115, 95.
64 Id I, pp. 116, 96.
65 Id I, pp. 127, 105.
The non-being of the world

Nevertheless, the most controversial declarations in Ideas I refer
to the possible annihilation of the world and its relation to the tran-
scendental ego. Thus, ‘while the being of consciousness, of any stream
of mental processes whatever, would indeed be necessarily modified
by an annihilation of the world of physical things, its own existence
would not be touched’66 because ‘no real being …is necessary to the
being of consciousness itself’67. The same suppositions are repeat-
edly maintained in Cartesian Meditations, where Husserl affirms that
the pure ego has an absolute existence, which would not be affected
by the non-existence of the world68. Thus, in the First Meditation
Husserl declares that ‘in spite of the continual experiencedness of the
world, a non-being of the world is conceivable’69. This thesis, which
posits the pure ego through a methodologically solipsistic reduction,
has generated confusions70, hesitations and even ardent rejections71.
66 Id I, pp. 110, 91.
67 Id I, pp. 110, 92.
68 CM, pp. 3, 45; 17, 57; 25, 64; 30, 69.
69 CM, pp. 17, 57.
70 In his commentaries on Ideas I, Levinas suggests that the solipsistic the-
sis be considered only as a diversion from the main Husserlian corpus of
ideas. Nonetheless, the hypothesis of the non-existence of the world is not
to be eliminated on the ground that consciousness cannot be conceived
as independent from the transcendent being. Conversely, for Levinas, the
problematic of the solipsistic argument is superfluous precisely because
consciousness is defined as intentionality, that is to say, as superseding the
traditional ‘subject/object’ dichotomy. Consequently, as Levinas points
out, ‘one should not use §49 as a basic text’ insofar as it represents a serious
negation of the fundamental intentional being of consciousness and a mere
regression to a dualistic discourse (TIH, p. 8). Correspondingly, the solip-
sistic methodology has to be considered as just a secondary presumption
that is refuted by Husserl’s more original and pivotal arguments concern-
ing the intentional substance of consciousness.
71 Some philosophers (Cf. T. Baldwin & D. Bell, ‘Phenomenology, solipsism
Indeed, the transcendental reduction, which demands a suspension

of the belief in the world as existing, inhibits the fundamental accep-
tance proper to the natural attitude. However, it is important to note
that the phenomenological reduction is better described as a ‘peculiar
change of focus’72 from the being of the world to the being-meant or
its modes of givenness, rather than as an annulment of the world.
Phenomenology is, in this context, a nullification of every onto-
logical commitment, which characterises the natural attitude, and
a constant effort to ‘un-ontologise’ the world73. Nevertheless, the
world is not transformed into a mere mental content of the tran-
scendental ego since the suspension of the world has sense precisely
because the world exists as such74. In this sense, epoché is not an
and egocentric thought’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supp. Vol 62,
1988, pp. 27-60) argue that the solipsistic foundational strategy is based
implicitly on the nullifying of all thoughts that depend on objects in the
world. For Husserl, states of consciousness seem to exist in the absence of the
world or the suspension of particular things. But a large class of conceptual
thoughts is dependent on the existence of particular objects. Consequently,
by annihilating the world, Husserl discovers an empty abstraction that, as
foundational for his philosophical programme, annuls the originality of the
phenomenological method. It seems, however, that the above criticism is
rooted in a misunderstanding of the Husserlian text. It is true that the for-
mation of conceptual thoughts can be shown to be genetically dependent on
the encountering of particular things. But the possibility of thoughts without
a posited belief in the existence of the world is conceivable..
72 Amsterdam Lectures, pp. 223, 314.
73 On this point D. Carr notices that ‘phenomenology’s transcendental at-
titude is distinguished by the fact that it is non-ontological’ (Phenomenol-
ogy and the Problem of History, Evanston, Northwestern University Press,
1974), p. 36.
74 As D. Zahavi emphasises, ‘it is first of all necessary to avoid misunderstand-
ing the transcendental epoché by seeing it as though it were an operation
that excluded the being and being-thus of the world from the domain of
phenomenological research’. Indeed, the reduction would not make sense if
it were a suspension of a belief that did not exist. Rather the thesis regard-
ing the existence of the world has to be reduced to a mere belief among
exclusion of the world, even in its pure and idealist Cartesian form,
but rather a deeper awareness of the question concerning its modes
of givenness. Thus, as Husserl notices in his Amsterdam Lectures,
‘placing something in parentheses [or brackets] mentally serves as
the index of the epoché. But inside the parentheses there is that
which is parenthesised’75. In other words, the solipsistic thesis is a
misinterpretation of the fundamental goal of the epoché and a mis-
conception of the Cartesian reductive performance since Husserl
does not attempt to reject the world as such but only to unveil its
modes of givenness. It is through this methodological neutralisa-
tion that the essential and pure dimension of the world-as-meant is
disclosed in a critical renunciation to all previous presuppositions.
Consequently, we can say that what defines the natural attitude
is the world as ‘real actuality’76. It is in this respect that the tran-
scendental move - through which being is taken to be just a claim
to being, as meaning real being - initiates a different approach to
world-constitution. Indeed, the passage from the natural to the
phenomenological attitude can be characterised as a transition
from the world as actuality to the ‘meant world purely as meant’77.
Correspondingly, the radical ‘neutralisation’ or ‘bracketing’ im-
poses a consideration of every real object only as an object meant,
withholding from natural and contingent validities.
From real being to being-meant

As outlined before, phenomenology is a shift of focus from real
being and actuality, to intentional meaning-structures and subjective
other possible beliefs, the reduction just changing our attitude towards
it. (Husserl and Transcendental Intersubjectivity, Athens, Ohio University
Press, 2001), p. 9.
75 Amsterdam Lectures, pp. 223, 313.
76 Id I, pp. 54, 51.
77 CM, pp. 37, 75.
formations. Far from being a world-annulment [Weltnichtigkeit],

phenomenology is in fact an investigation into the world as mere
phenomenon. In this sense, the Cartesian epoché, which starts with
a methodological bracketing of the world, is to be described as a tran-
sition from the world as reference (the object intended), to the world
as meant (the intended object just as intended, its modes of being
meant). But this transcendental reduction78 has to be supplemented
with an eidetic transition to the meant from a non-prejudiced and
non-vocational perspective. Therefore, the displacement of presence
and the passage towards meaning has to be supplemented by an ei-
detic variation of relative ontic meanings. The eidetic project starts
from a factual experience and acquires, by means of imaginative vari-
ation, the essential characteristics of a phenomenon. This free modi-
fication, an infinite process, open to a continuous effort of imagining
in fantasy new variations, elevates phenomenology to the level of
a scientific examination, grounded on a conceptual framework and
surpassing a mere flowing of singular phenomena, an endless variety
of modes of givenness of particular things. In this regard, the eidetic
variation is an instrument for attaining the transition from acciden-
tal qualities to essential characteristics.
The order of the reductions in the Cartesian epoché79gives us
insight into the essential forms of intentional constitution. Indeed,
the progressive methodology exposed in this context focuses on es-
sential structures and eidetic modes of givenness. Concerning the
problematic of world-constitution, this formal approach exhibits
78 For differentiating between the epoché and the transcendental reduction,
cf. Elisabeth Ströker, Husserl’s Transcendental Phenomenology (trans. L.
Hardy, Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 1993), p. 60.
79 Cf. CM, §34 the completion of the transcendental reduction with the inau-
guration of an eidetic path. In other words, if the transcendental movement
brackets the existence of the world and reveals the absolute evidence of the
pure ego, the eidetic reduction takes the transcendental ego from a level of
mere empirical, factual assertion to a level of exemplarity (eidos ego).
the bracketing of the doxical positing of existence in order to un-

veil the world-phenomenon belonging to the intentional realm of
consciousness. Phenomenology is hence not interested in the real
existence, or non-existence of the world, but is rather ‘inquiring
consistently and exclusively after the how of the world’s manner
of givenness’80. The world is, thus, a unity of sense, an intentional
formation that is constituted in sense-bestowing acts.
The world-horizon
The world is to be defined as pole of transcendence and ultimate
horizon of being81. The world is, for Husserl, the infinite perceptual
horizon, the background against which every object stands out, ‘an
endlessly open horizon’82. Husserl stresses the idea that the appearing
of singular things is different from the way in which the world is ex-
perienced. Indeed, a latent, immediately given consciousness of the
world is present in every perception of a real object (‘we are conscious
of the world always in terms of some object-content or other’83).
However, the world is not to be confused with a mere collection of
things or a synthesis of all perceivable objects (‘the world … does
not exist as an entity, as an object’84). The world is rather the hori-
zon of every perceived object, which, ‘without particular objects of
consciousness…cannot be actual [aktuelle]’85. It is implied therefore
that the world is, to a certain extent, given alongside other objects,
80 C, p. 160, §46.
81 If in Logical Investigations Husserl is more interested in addressing the
problem concerning the modes of givenness of objects and the specific acts
that correspond to them, in Ideas it is the world as such that is investigated,
the horizon of every thing-constitution.
82 C, p. 35, §9c.
83 C, p. 109, §28.
84 C, p. 143, §37.
85 C, p. 143, §37.
yet not as an object of direct perception but in a completely different

manner. In other words, though ‘given’ in every object-perception,
the world is never intuited or experienced in the way objects are. The
world is rather the horizon within which things are given.
As stated previously, thing-constitution brings forth different
modes of horizonality [Horizonthaftigkeit]: the internal horizon en-
compassing potential perceptual aspects of the intended object, the
external horizon of co-intended objects, and, on the noetic side, a
temporal horizon formed by ego’s lived-experiences. But how is the
world-horizon different from all the other horizonal-modalities?
Is it the case that, as the ego is not to be reduced to a particu-
lar act but is rather to be envisaged as a unitary flow, a unifying
pole in relation to its acts, similarly, the world-horizon is not to be
reduced to particular noematic horizonal formations involved in
object-apprehensions but rather presents itself as a unitary horizon
that accompanies every object-givenness86? Referring to the rela-
tion between the internal/external horizons and the world, Husserl
notices that the whole horizon of the world is not to be reduced to
momentary fields of actual or potential perception since these are
only ‘sectors’ of the world. Nevertheless, the world exhibits itself
86 L. Landgrebe takes this parallelism further, insofar as he interprets the
absolute primal evidence of the world as grounded on the unitary temporal
self-constitution of the subject. In this sense, the historical world, which,
Husserl affirms, is connected to an a priori structure, is nothing else than
a factual experience based on the primal evidence of the temporal tran-
scendental subject. For Landgrebe, ‘the crisis of the a priori’ is solved by
observing the ultimately grounding ego and its self-temporality. In this
respect, he states: ‘this subjectivity…implies in itself the one world common
to everyone’ (p. 168). Thus, the invariant structure of the world unfolds the
universal transcendental subjectivity. (‘The Problem Posed by the Tran-
scendental Science of the A Priori of the Life-World’, in Apriori and World.
European Contributions to Husserlian Phenomenology, W. McKenna, R. M.
Harlan & L. E. Winters eds.), pp. 152-172.
‘through its internal and external horizon-validities’87, being rather

a relational sense-formation.
The distinction between thing-constitution and world-con-
stitution brings to light the complex problematic of horizonal-
intentionality and the specific modes of givenness of the world.
According to the Cartesian epoché, the world is an intentional
meaning-structure that has to be examined in connection to essen-
tial structures of consciousness. In this sense, the reduction clari-
fies precisely the difference between background and horizon, i.e.
referential actuality and meaning. The world-horizon is a subjective
meaning structure that is given by means of an intentional horizon-
consciousness. However, in the analyses presented so far, the world
as meaning-formation has been considered from an abstractive per-
spective, as a mere formal and ‘ready-made’ structure. But how is
this unity of sense constituted in the sense-bestowing activity of
transcendental subjectivity? How is sense-formation to explain the
identical meaning-structure that is disclosed in perceptual activity?
To respond to these interrogations, we have to take our exploration
a step further into the genesis of constitution.
c. Towards a regressive phenomenology:

the world given as pre-given
Genetic constitution
The transcendental genesis of the world will bring a sense-
sedimentation intentional analysis into objective constitution. In
Analyses Concerning Passive and Active Synthesis Husserl distin-
guishes, under the heading ‘Static and Genetic Phenomenological
Method’, between static constitutive phenomenology and genetic
analyses. Whereas the former presents essential intentional forms
87 C, p. 162, §47.
and ‘finished’ meaning-formations, the latter take into account the

genetic becoming of a unity of sense and the sphere of passivity
that accompanies active experiences. Opposing progressive or static
constitution, to regressive or genetic constitutive phenomenol-
ogy, Husserl notes that ‘we can therefore distinguish “explanatory”
phenomenology as a phenomenology of regulated genesis, and
“descriptive” phenomenology as a phenomenology of possible, es-
sential shapes’88. Concerning the transcendental genesis of world-
constitution, the contrast to a static exposition of modes of given-
ness is of utmost importance and is reflected in the problematic
of the life-world. Indeed, in a regressive approach, the reductive
procedure itself, starting with the natural attitude, considers the
history of constitution of the world as sense-genesis. In this per-
spective, the regressive or ‘backward reflection’89 expands the static
essential description of the world-phenomenon to unveil the pre-
constitution [Vorkonstitution] of a pre-given world.
The life-world
Whereas the Cartesian epoché commences with a putting out
of play of world-validities in order to focus on the world as mere
phenomenon, the Kantian90 reduction reverses the order of the
static reductive move (ego-cogitatio-cogitata) and begins with the
natural life-world as an undoubted datum91. Elaborating his genet-
ic constitutional phenomenology, Husserl remarks that ‘beginning
88 APAS, pp. 629, 340.
89 C, p. 72, §15.
90 For a more extended examination of the Husserlian reductive paths, cf. for
instance I. Kern, ‘The three ways to the transcendental phenomenological
reduction in the philosophy of Edmund Husserl’ (Husserl. Expositions and
Appraisals, F. A. Elliston & P. McCormick eds., Notre Dame, University
of Notre Dame Press, 1977, pp. 126-150).
91 C, p. 171, §50.
with the natural attitude, one can also take the “natural concept of
the world” as a leading clue’92. The novelty of such an investigation
into world-constitution is that it exposes the world not as a static
meaning-formation, but as already involved into a factual genesis
and a sense-sedimentation history. The role of the regressive inquiry
is to explain the ultimate sources of objective constitution and to
reshape the presentation of modes of givenness of the world insofar
as they presuppose modes of pre-givenness93.
If in the Idea of Phenomenology Husserl declares that the reduc-
tive program imposes him ‘to strike out the pre-givenness of any-
thing transcendent’94, in Crisis the concrete life-world of the natural
attitude becomes the pre-given ground of the reduction to ultimate
sense-formations. Accordingly, whereas in the static Cartesian anal-
ysis the eidetic follows the transcendental reduction, the regressive
turn demands that we reverse this order and initiate the reductive
movement by an eidetic inquiry into the invariant structures of the
concrete life-world. The world is thus to be investigated from a natu-
ral perspective and defined in its naïve experiencing concreteness.
With regard to the potential interpretative values of Husserl’s ideas,
we propose the following structure:
Natural attitude
The sensibly-intuited world is the original experience of the life-
world as empirical intuition, pre-scientific actual life, and concrete
perceptual givenness. The concrete experience of the world presents
us with the real world, ‘the one that is actually given through per-
ception, that is ever experienced and experienceable – our every-
92 APAS, pp. 633, 344.
93 A. Steinbock, Home and Beyond. Generative Phenomenology after Husserl
(Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1995), p. 83.
94 Idea, pp. 35, 46.
day life-world’95. Correlated to this description is the surrounding

life-world, or ‘the intuitive surrounding world of life’96. The life-
world as Umwelt is also subjective and relative97 - the habitual con-
crete world in which we live. In this respect, Husserl remarks that
‘what is actually first is the “merely subjective-relative” intuition of
pre-scientific world-life’98. In opposition to the objective and non-
intuitable world of science, the subjective life-world is in fact the
natural experience of our every-day living processes.
The inductive objectivity characterising the world of sciences
operates with a concept of the world that opposes the subjective-
relative appearances to the endless task of constructing one objec-
tive spatiotemporal world. However, the objectification of nature
is reminiscent of an inductive empirical generalisation formed in
the perceptual and experiential life-world. In this sense, the objec-
tively actual world that sciences postulate has to be integrated back
into the experiential process of perceptual activity. Indeed, as Husserl
points out, sciences substitute a prejudiced concept of objectivity to
the concrete world. Consequently, the regressive inquire has to fol-
low the genesis of objective sciences from the world of experience.
Eidetic reduction
The sensibly-intuited world can also be envisaged as invariant
typology, resulting from an eidetic variation of the subjective ex-
periencing intuition. In this context, the intuitable world becomes
95 C, p. 49, §9h.
96 C, p. 121, §33.
97 For suggestions regarding possible interpretation of the notion of life-world,
cf. also J. N. Mohanty, ‘Husserl on Relativism in the Late Manuscripts’, in
Husserl in Contemporary Context (B. C. Hopkins ed., Dordrecht, Kluwer
Academic Publishers, 1997), pp. 181-189.
98 C, p. 125, §34a. Cf. p. 133, §34; p. 138, §36; p. 157, §45; p. 170, §50.
‘an empirical over-all style’99, a ‘world-style’100, and ‘an invariant

form’101. Describing the process of eidetic variation, Husserl affirms
that, by altering the world in free imagination, we can acquire ‘the
general style which this intuitive world, in the flow of total expe-
rience, persistently maintains’102. Thus, the essential structure of
the experienceable and actual life-world is the result of an eidetic
variation, which is still, to a certain extent, inscribed in the natural
attitude, within an ontological rather than phenomenological per-
spective. Indeed, analysing this aspect, Husserl notes that an ‘ontol-
ogy of the life-world’ is possible even in the natural attitude as an
inquiry into ‘the essentially lawful set of types’ of the subjective-
relative experiential world103.
The world-form104 is also generated as an essential form from
the relative and concrete subjective life-worlds but starts from the
assumption that ‘pre-scientifically, the world is already a spatiotem-
poral world’105. Indeed, Husserl often describes the world as ‘an
infinitely open spatio-temporal-causal world and a development
whole’106. Accordingly, the world as ‘general structure’ can result
from eidetic variation of concrete causal and spatiotemporal deter-
minations that characterise the actual perceptual life-world. If in
the natural experience of the life-world, ‘spatiotemporality (as “liv-
ing”, not as logicomathematical) belongs to its own ontic meaning
99 C, p. 31, §9b.
100 C, p. 32, §9b.
101 C, p. 31, §9b.
102 C, p. 31, §9b. Cf. p. 51, §9h.
103 C, p. 173, §51. Cf. p. 142, §37.
104 For a supplementary account of the eidetic variation of the experiential
world of the natural attitude, cf. PP, §9d-f
105 C, p. 139, §36.
106 APAS, pp. 366, 234.
as life-world’107, in an eidetic, but non-inductive, reductive attitude

the world is again described as an essential invariant form.
Transcendental reduction
The world is sense-formation, ‘original meaning’108 that forms
the primordial basis of all meaning-formations. Referring to tran-
scendental procedures, Husserl observes that the life-world is a sub-
jective structure, a ‘mental acquisition’, a ‘mental configuration’, or
a ‘meaning-construct’ [Sinngebilde]109. In this context, the transcen-
dental move operates the reduction of the existent world to the world
as a phenomenon110 and its subjective manners of givenness111. Thus,
through regression to the intentional origins of the meaning-forma-
tion, the world is transformed into a ‘meaning “system of poles for a
transcendental subjectivity”’112. The world can also be envisaged as
world-horizon, as an universal and open ‘horizon of possible thing-
experience [Dingerfahrung]’113. It is important to stress again the fact
that for Husserl the notion of world-horizon brings forth, in con-
trast to the inner or external horizons of object-perception, a mean-
ing structure114, a relational, rather than positional formation, distinct
from the background of all perceptions. Moreover, the transcendental
reduction does not instate different world-intentional descriptions,
107 C, p. 168, §49.
108 C, p. 56, §9.k
109 C, p. 113, §29.
110 C, p. 152, §41; p. 152, §42; p. 153, §42 (‘the world and the natural experi-
ence of it are experienced as “phenomenon”’.
111 C, p. 165, §48; p. 168, §49.
112 C, p. 177, §52.
113 C, p. 138, §36.
114 Cf., for instance, C, p. 158, §45: ‘every perception has, “for consciousness”,
a horizon belonging to its object (i.e., whatever is meant in the perception)’,
(my emphasis).
but rather multiple aspects of the same meaning-formation. The

world as ground [Boden] supplements the transcendental perspective
on world-constitution. Indeed, the life-world epoché unveils the ‘un-
spoken ground’ of all scientific ‘cognitive accomplishments’115, ‘the
grounding soil’ [der gründende Boden]116 of all praxis and objective
sciences117. Likewise, in a manuscript from 1934118, Husserl points
to the experience of the world as absolute synthetic unity, as the pri-
mordial soil which cannot be experienced as a physical body, or real
referential space, but is rather the horizonal sphere, the original and
absolute ground-meaning presupposed by all human life119.
Passive genesis
To sum up, in the regressive genetic reflection, the transcenden-
tal reduction completes the eidetic accomplishments of our world-
constitution. The emphasis on the intentional meaning-structure
rather than objective reference has disclosed the context of a sense-
sedimentation that has its origins in a passive givenness of the life-
world. Consequently, the passage from the natural attitude to its ei-
detic and invariant structures, and, then, to the transcendental genesis
of constitution, unveils a sense-history that inquires back into a sub-
jective sphere of passivity. Thus, the life-world epoché completes the
Cartesian reduction by giving us a perspective on the genetic forma-
tion of the intentional world-constitution. In this regard, if the static
examination investigates the meaning-configurations of intentional-
115 C, p. 116, §30.
116 C, p. 131, §34e.
117 C, p. 140, §36; p. 142, §37; p. 147, §38; p. 154, §43; p. 155, §44.
118 Manuscript D 17, ‘L’arche-originaire Terre ne se meut pas’ (trans. D.
Franck), in La Terre ne se meut pas, pp. 11-30.
119 The world is, thus, ‘sol d’expérience de tous les corps’, ‘Terre-sol unique’, ‘sys-
tème de lieux’, ‘archi-lieu’, ‘sol-souche’, ‘patrie originaire’ and ‘archi-foyer’.
consciousness as mere ready-made structures, the regressive procedure

brings to light the passive, primordial constitution. Accordingly, the
modes of givenness of the world are traced back to a pre-given ulti-
mate foundation, which is the correlate of a transcendental subjectivi-
ty pre-giving the world. The active constitution of the world is, hence,
grounded in ‘our passive having of the world’120. The world-horizon,
the ground of all world-life, is pre-given to every human being, not as
an active acquisition, but as a passive intentional formation.
From our considerations, we have deduced that, in the world-
constitution, a genetic sense is involved. The singularity of the world,
which has been exemplified through an investigation into static and
genetic constitution, implies that a layer of passive genesis has to be
taken into account insofar as the world-horizon is concerned. But,
if we return to a generic analysis, the repetitive and synthetic aspects
that we rejected in our previous chapter are reintroduced. Before we
conclude this discussion, let us investigate one more possibility: the
world as total-space. If the world is given through historical geneses,
then what comes before its generic constitution?
d.The pre-phenomenal space

The pre-givenness of the world
Phenomenology is a reflective inquiry built upon the con-
tinuous living of the natural attitude. In this sense, the phenom-
enological description is centred on the unveiling of the modes of
givenness of intentional objects. However, in the case of world-
constitution, the regressive reflection reveals ‘a science of the
universal how of the pre-givenness of the world’121, an original
gift which is inaccessible to experiential focus. Moreover, Husserl
120 C, p. 108, §28.
121 C, p. 146, §38.
seems to suggest that the meaning-bestowing acts which refer to

objects in the world are completely different from the intention-
al pre-givenness of the world-horizon. Indeed, underlining the
idea that the world is not an entity or an object intuited directly
through perceptual experience, Husserl states that ‘the world is
pre-given thereby, in every case, in such a way that individual
things are given’122. That is to say, perceptual objects appear as
always surrounded by a field of co-perceived objects, which are,
in turn, integrated into even wider environments of kinetic fields.
However, the world is never to be identified with a kinetic field,
which can be perceived in actuality by the subject. The world is
not the visible surrounding of the appearing objects, but presents
itself, phenomenologically, as a total spatial nexus. Nevertheless,
the world is constituted as the actual pole of a universal perceptu-
al activity only with the advent of objectual appearances. Thus, a
generic phenomenological constitution does not confer primacy
to the world as transcendental phenomenon, but correlates it to
thing-constitution123. Moreover, since perception includes both
passive and active moments, it can be stated that, if world realities
can become objects of attentive perception, the natural world as
such is never encompassed in perceptual activity as a direct object
of focus. Consequently, the marginal perception of the world in
the natural attitude is transmuted, at a phenomenological level,
into a relational meaning-formation. The world as a pre-given
horizon is, hence, a relational intentional object which, in the
situation of a naïve positing of existence, is grasped as forever
marginal and refusing perceptual reality.
122 C, p. 143, §37.

123 Cf. PP, pp. 71-72, 95-96.
The total-space
The world is, from a phenomenological perspective, pre-phe-
nomenal spatiality, which, similarly to the time-constituting con-
sciousness, receives its fullness from the transcendence of things.
Therefore, the pre-given dimension of the world has to be interpreted
as pointing towards a pre-phenomenal unity, a ‘total space’124, which
constitutes the continuous nexus of things in the world. The image
of the Earth-ground has already clarified the issue of the impossible
multiplication of the world, since, with the appearing of a second
ground-soil, the first one is to become a constituent of a synthetic
and more encompassing unity, i.e. the authentic nexus-world. As
Husserl declares in Thing and Space, the world is ‘the unity of the to-
tal space constituted for perception, the space which encompasses all
bodies although it is not itself a body’125. In fact, one can affirm that
the world functions as a referential order, similar to the way in which
the living body is defined as a referential centre. The world is, thus,
not a particular horizon that is co-presented in perception, but is a
pre-phenomenal unity that unifies in synthetic formations the per-
ceptual elements involved in thing-constitution. On this level, the
world is not in space, though it makes possible space-constitution. It
is named total space in conformity with the constituted objects, but
the world is not properly speaking a perceived reality.
Singularity and the pre-phenomenal

From our investigations into the constitutive levels involved in
the formation of time and space as phenomenological data, we can
conclude that the study of the most encompassing syntheses brings
us to the limits of the descriptive discourse. Fink himself declared in
124 DR, pp. 66, 80; 68, 82; 69, 83.
125 DR, pp. 69, 83.
a conversation with Cairns that Husserl’s explanation on the ques-

tion of the origin of space and time leads to paralogisms126. The rea-
son is that questions about ultimate wholes (Ganzheitsfragen) cannot
be approached through genetic constitution because the origin of
these sense-formations escapes our conceptual tools. The horizon-
consciousness that defines our transcendental structure implies that a
clear and full givenness, which cannot be accepted even in the case of
simpler perceptual processes, is impossible as regards these ultimate
wholes. In fact, the descriptive method is not applicable to time and
space-constitution. When we follow back, in a regressive analysis, the
origin of this constitution we enter a pre-phenomenal realm.
Consequently, the pre-phenomenal is definitively singular: it is
unique and non-repetitive, it precedes the actual geneses of sense-
formation, and does not have communal characteristics. However,
the major problem that remains open is the fact that a ‘phenomenol-
ogy’ of the pre-phenomenal is highly paradoxical and does not offer a
pure phenomenological account. Indeed, when forced into phenom-
enological givenness, the pre-phenomenal has to use analogies and
repetitive images. This means that Husserl’s thinking does not make
possible a phenomenology of a pre-phenomenal singularity.
Conclusion: Husserl’s phenomenological singularity

In the first part of our book, we analysed the possibility of a
phenomenology of the singular in Husserl’s texts. In order to iden-
tify the lines of inquiry that we had to follow, we employed a di-
vision of the phenomena into wholes and parts. In accordance,
the first chapter examined the singularity of the hyletic data as the
ultimate substratum of any phenomenological constitution. Our
considerations proved that the non-synthetic aspect of sense-da-
ta, which made them a good candidate for singularity, had to be

revised in light of temporal constitution. The singular is already
repetitive127 and blocks further access to deeper levels of constitu-
tion. In a second attempt to delimit singularity, we presented the
manifold-unities of particulars as unique clusters of characteristics.
However, the research was, once more, brought to an impasse: the
genetic formation of transcendental individuals and transcendent
objects unveiled a repetitive structure which cannot encompass its
primitive elements. With this result in mind, we then turned to the
ultimate wholes in the hierarchy constructed in our introductory
part. But, as a result, the phenomenology of the singular became
pre-phenomenological! Indeed, the absolute flow of time, though
escaping temporal constitution, cannot be given unless it engages
into analogies. The generic repetition, based on syntheses of iden-
tification and differentiation, introduces a comparative approach
that refutes singularity. Furthermore, the same problem appeared
when we investigated world-constitution in its most primitive for-
mation: the total-space. Consequently, the question of singularity
remains unsolved within a strict Husserlian phenomenology. In
fact, a negative solution seems to be more appropriate: there can-
not be a phenomenology of singularity.
Indeed, the problem of singularity has proved to be a signif-
icant test for phenomenology, pushing the complex question of
givenness to its limits. A philosophy of reflection is always chal-
lenged by factual immediacy, since living experiences can only be
recuperated as a constituted given. The problem is even more acute
for phenomenology, as the reduction sets aside the investigation
into the being of things in order to focus upon the given as that
127 For Husserls, a repetitive structure is not compatible with singularity be-
cause repetition is not creative, as it is for Deleuze, but rather habitual and
based on the identification of the same.
which is given to the subject. In this context, the primordial given

becomes an ideal to which the phenomenological program cannot
abide. To use again one of Fink’s distinction, we can say that the
original givenness is the operative field that forms the ground of
phenomenology. However, the phenomenological grasp is limited
and does not breach the distance that separates it from life. The sin-
gular, whether or not an aspect of the given, is purely presumptive
and regulative, rather than descriptive. Is, though, the operative
shadow of life inescapable? In Fink’s opinion ‘no human philoso-
phy at all is in full, complete and “shadow-free” self-possession of
its concepts, has them in the clear, penetrating light of truth’128.
Or, stated differently, ‘the presence of a shadow is an essential fea-
ture of finite philosophising’129. In the case of Husserl’s phenom-
enological investigations, singularity is never brought to givenness.
The reason is that the singular in itself, independent from the acts
of the constituting subject, is an uncertain datum, a mere projec-
tion of consciousness into the constituted world. As we have seen,
phenomenology displaces concerns for reality in order to stress the
givenness of its modes of being meant. In this light, singularity has
to be envisaged solely in relation to the giving subjectivity. But,
the singular is absent for the constituting consciousness and has
no actual basis of justification. Indeed, from a phenomenological
perspective, consciousness is grounded on a representational and
repetitive function. Accordingly, the experience of the singular be-
comes a phenomenological moment of synthesis.
Nevertheless, a legitimate question is to be asked in the context
of this criticism. Is there a singular in itself ‘behind’ the conscious-
ness of it, i.e. the phenomenon that is considered in constitutional
analyses? From a phenomenological viewpoint, conferring indepen-
128 E.Fink, ‘Operative concepts in Husserl’s phenomenology’, p. 64.
129 E. Fink, art. cit., p. 69.
dent existence to singulars is presumptive, characterising the dog-

matic, natural attitude of everyday life. The intentional relation,
which posits consciousness and objectivity as belonging together,
suspends the naïve assumption that supports the idea of a singular
in itself. The reduced thing is a constituted unity and a given tran-
scendent pole. However, phenomenology does not construct a mi-
metic approach to reality, or an imaginative130 world of singulars. As
Husserl points out, ‘the lived experience, the absolute datum, stands
there in the flesh; it is not somehow merely fantasised, thought in a
simile or conceived completely symbolically and conceptually, but
it is given before our eyes as itself, actual, and now’131. It is this af-
firmation that we have to consider if the given is to have a veridi-
cal status in phenomenology. In other words, if the given is to be
grasped in an intentional manner as a given meant by consciousness
in constitutional processes, then the question of a singular being is
to be disregarded in favour of a strict phenomenological concern.
To sum up, we can assert that the investigation of Husserl’s
phenomenology of the singular has made possible a further distinc-
tion: namely, the one between a singular givenness and the phe-
nomenological givenness of the singular. Thus, a singular given-
ness cannot be accepted because of the comparative basis of our
constitutive efforts, which are generic, merely repetitive and based
on prior and more primitive elements. Similarly, the givenness of a
singular datum demands for an incursion into a pre-phenomenal
realm. However, for Husserl, the two aspects of a phenomenology
of the singular are to be treated as identical, because the singular
as existing prior to a phenomenological account has to be invali-
dated. So, to the question of whether there is a phenomenology
130 On the importance of imagination in a phenomenology of singularity, cf.
the concluding part of this study.
131 DR, pp. 19, 21.
of singularity, one has to answer negatively, if a strict Husserlian

approach is to be preserved. Nevertheless, in the next section of
our book, a different account will be exposed, which transgresses
the strict descriptive account of Husserl’s phenomenology. For the
authors that we will examine, phenomenology is far from being in-
compatible with the singular, understood in terms of givenness or
as existing prior to our constitutive experiences. In fact, for them,
phenomenology can only be directed towards singulars and, as a
consequence, a more radical type of inquiry has to be posited. But
is phenomenology still ‘phenomenological’, when this transforma-
tion is performed? Is Husserl’s thought of the singular a regional
answer to a deeper challenge that has found a pertinent treatment
only in later phenomenological developments? It is true that we of-
ten refer to singulars in our everyday considerations. But is singu-
larity just a prejudice associated to illegitimate claims to reality? Or
is there something more profound in the search for the singular?
Phenomenology, in its critical approach to reality, is an instrument
for refuting experiential myths. In this sense, if singularity is to be
acknowledged as a justifiable prerogative, we have to remain within
the area of a phenomenological research. So can phenomenology
offer a positive treatment of the question of singularity? In a con-
tinuous dialogue with Husserl’s writings, we will envisage, in the
second part of our study, two potential contributions to a phenom-
enology of singularity. Following Levinas’s and Henry’s intuitions,
we will, subsequently, be able to delimit the specificity of this type
of phenomenological enterprise. To give them credence, despite
Husserl’s account, phenomenology is all about singularity….
PART TWO
PHENOMENOLOGY OF SINGULARITY
(E. LEVINAS AND M. HENRY)
…‘the higher levels of phenomenological analysis lead us to
problems of phenomenological construction, the construc-
tion of phenomenological hypotheses’ (Husserl)1.
… ‘phenomenological constructions are necessary wherever

the object of study is not to be brought to self-givenness’
(Husserl)2.
CHAPTER V
LEVINAS ON THE SINGULARISING
SINGULARITY OF THE OTHER
In this chapter, we will offer a positive insight into a phenom-

enology of the singular, starting with a presentation of the critical
distance that Levinas takes in relation to Husserl’s philosophical
project. After delimiting the direction of Levinas’s phenomenologi-
cal inquiry, we will introduce a first configuration of the singular in
the obsession of existents with existence. In the subsequent parts,
the turn to being is refuted in favour of a more reductive approach,
which exposes us to the intricacies of a phenomenology of the
other. The last section of this chapter will deepen the complexity
2 Ibid.
184 PHENOMENOLOGY OF SINGULARITY
of Levinas’s phenomenological account by disclosing an otherwise

than temporality, language, or appearing phenomenality.
1. Singularity beyond Husserl

Singularity vs. syntheses of difference/identification
The restrictive nature of synthetic intentionality propels
Husserl’s successors to undertake a critical approach towards the
formulation of phenomenology in its initial terms. Working at the
limits of a phenomenological account, the two phenomenologists
of singularity that we will introduce in the last part of this book
provoke violence within givenness, so that the singular can be con-
fronted to the idea of immediate givenness. In contradistinction to
an obsesive interest in difference, what characterises these authors
is the fact that commonality, even in terms of distinctiveness, or
classical difference3, is to be excluded. With regard to difference, we
can refer to Levinas’s remark that ‘thesis and antithesis, in repelling
3 It is unquestionable that Derrida’s contribution to this topic cannot be
ignored. Differance is not a conceptual difference, nor a dialectical oppo-
sition, or a synthesis of contraries. Derrida’s differance is, in fact, a con-
tinuation of the theme of singularity and of the way in which difference
is conditioned and ‘produced’ through a more ‘original’ archi-trace. For
example, in his essay called ‘La différance’ (Marges de la philosophie, Paris,
Minuit, 1972) Derrida talks about differance as ‘l’<<origine>> non-pleine,
non-simple, l’origine structurée et différante des différences’ (p.12). Apart
from re-addressing the question of the origin and the original, which de-
fines the phenomenologues of singularity, and from the commonality of
themes that singularises the latter ones (e.g. the ‘trace’, the ‘archi-origin’),
Derrida’s texts can be regarded as a valuable attack on the traditional con-
cept of difference. However, for Derrida differance implies a play between
identity and difference (Cf., for instance, F. Laruelle, Les philosophies de la
différence, Paris, PUF, 1997), whereas for Levinas this contamination with
identity would have to be refuted as not radical enough.
SINGULARISING SINGULARITY OF THE OTHER 185
one another, call for one another’4. Indeed, synthesis returns in a

hidden form in the case of difference, since a paradoxical correla-
tion is established between the opposition of the terms. To contin-
ue the previous idea, the contrasting poles ‘appear in opposition to
a synoptic gaze that encompasses them’. However, the singularity
of the radical transcendence is of the order of the ‘non-integrate-
able’. In this sense, ‘correlation does not suffice as a category for
transcendence’5. That is to say, separation has to be, in the case of
the singular, a positive, rather than a privative characteristic. There
is no opposition, but pure singularity, which cannot enter dualis-
tic limitations, or antithetic distinctions. Singularity is, therefore,
not one of the terms of an inter-play between contrasts, nor their
bringing together under the category of a neutral. Singularity is
a non-synthetic and non-synthetisable uniqueness, defined as ei-
ther absolute otherness, or as radical auto-donation. Singularity
resembles the event in its brevity and lack of anticipation. But,
whereas singularity concerns phenomenology insofar as it hints to
an account of givenness, the event is more related to the category of
being, of what happens within the postulated being of existents. It
is precisely this commitment to givenness that calls for singularity,
without equally presuming any prior contract with existence. But
is the failure of descriptive reference, which we followed within the
hesitations present in Husserl’s oeuvre, pointing to the impossible
givenness of the singular as such? Is the bond to givenness, which
we mentioned earlier, just an ideal that reiterates its inadequacy
with every new attempt to givenness? Is it the case that singularity
cannot be described directly because we never experience it as a liv-
ing givenness? Let us direct our attention to two attempts at giving
4 TI, p. 53. Also, Levinas’s emphasis on the separation of the singular: ‘this
absolute independence, which does not posit itself by opposing’ (TI, p. 60).
5 TI, p. 53.
form to singularity at the borders of phenomenology, and measure

the specificity of this givenness against Husserl’s interpretation.
From our analyses into Husserl’s texts on the question of sin-
gularity we have concluded that phenomenology reaches the limits
of its constitutive powers in relation to a non-synthetic conscious-
ness. Indeed, if phenomenology is to preserve the quest for the things
themselves, it seems that the givenness of the phenomenal being is
always comparative and never singular. It is this aspect of Husserl’s
phenomenology that Levinas questions, insofar as the constitutive
consciousness of the transcendental ego suppresses the rich texture of
the thing in itself and the singularity of the transcendent. Thus, the
syntheses of difference/identification, which control the phenom-
enological project, have to be rejected in the light of a new attempt
to grasp the being of the phenomenal. The rule of synthetic given-
ness is to be set aside, so that a more original singularity reveals itself.
From within phenomenology, Levinas denounces the interest for the
constitutive consciousness as being an option for anonymity. It is, in-
stead, the appearing transcendence, and not the constitutive dimen-
sion of the appearing, that is discovered to be primordial. The effort
is still phenomenological, since the givenness of being is the norm of
Levinas’s discourse. But the focus in the constitutive-constituted rela-
tion now veers towards transcendence, as to evoke the singularity of
life that the transcendental reduces to mere synthesis. For Levinas, it
is the Other-in-the-Same that represents the force of singularity and
of the non-synthetic, described, significantly, as ‘the unique unique-
ness of monotheism’ [unicité unique du monothéisme]6. Consequently,
the discontent with synthetic consciousness and with the difficulty
of conceiving singularity in terms of a phenomenal givenness forces
Levinas to attempt an account of the singular from within the limits
6 Levinas, ‘Positivité et transcendance’, in Positivité et transcendance (J.-L.
Marion ed, Paris, PUF, 2000), p. 17.
of a phenomenological project. Indeed, he strives to apprehend ‘the

immediacy of a nameless singularity, which can be designated only
by pointing the finger to it’7. It is, thus, the fascination with radical
transcendence as singularity that imposes a reconsideration of the
Husserlian themes in order to indicate the problematic of excess in
phenomenology.
Phenomenology as a theory of being

In Levinas’s discourse, the appeal to singularity appears ini-
tially to coincide with that of life. There is a permanent hesita-
tion between an ontological thesis with regard to the real as sphere
of singularity, where things exist in a specific uniqueness, and a
phenomenological reduction to a particular type of intentionality,
which is presented as affectivity. As a result, Levinas’s interpretation
of Husserl’s philosophy aims at the restoration of phenomenology
as a theory of being. As he maintains in his examination, he is not
engaged in a purely descriptive approach, but rather in a reformu-
lation of the positive directions of Husserl’s phenomenology8.
7 ‘immédiat d’une singularité sans nom qui ne se désigne que du doigt’, Posi-
tivité et Transcendance, p. 30.
8 Some scholars consider Levinas’s reading of Husserl’s texts as inadequate.
For example, F. Aubay (‘Conscience, immanence et non-présence: E. Lévi-
nas, lecteur de Husserl, Alter, 1, 1993, pp. 297-318) shows that Levinas
equates consciousness, presence and immanence in his analyses of Hus-
serl’s phenomenology, disregarding the tension that the latter attempts to
maintain throughout his work between presence and non-presence. Ac-
cordingly, in overlooking this essential aspect, Levinas departs with erro-
neous assumptions from Husserl’s phenomenology: ‘is not the departure of
Levinas from Husserl partially motivated by a misunderstanding?’ (p. 316). In
my opinion, as we have noted above, Levinas purposefully applies an unfaith-
ful reading to Husserl’s investigations in order to deploy his own thinking. So,
Levinas’s misunderstanding is in reality an interpretative strategy that does
We have interpreted the constitutional problems as ontological

problems and have seen their essential task: to throw light on the
meaning of existence. This interpretation, which seems to clarify
the philosophical role par excellence of the phenomenology of
consciousness, may be the aspect in which we have been more
explicit than Husserl himself9.
Therefore Levinas proposes a reworking of the radical distinction
between phenomenology as theory of being, and its epistemologi-
cal dimension. Levinas’s urge to confer an ontological dimension
to the phenomenological inquiry, which bears an evident parallel-
ism with the Heideggerian10 primacy of the Seinsfrage11, has to be
not aim at textual reproduction. On the issue of the philosophical dialogue
between Levinas and Husserl, I have to point to another, more audacious, sug-
gestion. Namely, R. D. Walsh (‘Husserl and Levinas: transformations of the
epoche’, Analecta Husserliana, 36, A.-T. Tymieniecka ed., Dordrecht, Kluwer,
1991, pp. 283-296) hints to the probability of Levinas’s influence, through his
book The Theory of Intuition, on Husserl’s later revision of the reduction. Thus,
Walsh notes, ‘there may have been reciprocity between these two’ thinkers on
the question of methodology. As above, this statement overstates the similar-
ity of the works of Levinas and Husserl, and, contrary to the previous opinion,
it gives too much weight to their final “convergence”.
9 TIH, p. 154.
10 Ethics and Infinity, anthologising a series of later interviews with Philippe
Nemo, expresses explicitly this Heideggerian influence on Levinas’s read-
ing of Husserl: ‘the work that I did then on “the theory of intuition” in
Husserl, was influenced by Sein und Zeit, to the extent that I was trying
to present Husserl as having grasped the ontological problem of being, the
question of the status rather than that of the quiddity of beings’. (p. 36)
11 The influence of Heidegger, definitely stated in the Introduction (…Mar-
tin Heidegger, whose influence on this book will often be felt’, xxxiii), is
so significant that the first interpretation of Husserl by Levinas has been
considered as ‘non-Husserlian introduction to Husserl’ (‘Levinas avant
Levinas’, Jean-Francois Lavigne, in Emmanuel Levinas, Positivité et tran-
scendance, suivi de Levinas et la phénoménologie, PUF, 2000,p. 59). To a
translated as an effort to seize the uniqueness of life which represen-

tational consciousness dissolves. Indeed, the main critical observa-
tion that Levinas’s interpretative exposition reveals is concerned with
the primacy of the theoretical consciousness in Husserl’s text. The
ontological ground of the Husserlian phenomenology represents, in
reality, the major position that can escape reflective intentionality.
This constitutes, as we shall demonstrate, Levinas’s fundamental
objection against the Husserlian philosophy, which is characterised
as a form of intellectualism. Though Husserl emphasises the value
of the voluntary and affective aspects present in intentional acts,
the theoretical categories are still the most significant part of inten-
tionality. The role of representation as foundational for all the other
modalities of the intentional life provokes Levinas’s dissatisfaction
with Husserl’s phenomenology.
The pre-eminence of a cognitive attitude, articulated in the
‘doxic thesis’, implies that, for Husserl, ‘existence remains tightly
bound to the notion of theory, to the notion of knowledge, despite
all the elements in his system that seem to lead us to a richer no-
tion of existence’12. The intentional act, related to the horizons of
the given phenomena, represents a disguised form of cognition.
From this perspective, Levinas repeatedly affirms that ‘in a certain
certain degree, Levinas cannot visualise the radical difference imposed by
Heidegger, but considers him to be the one that continues and accom-
plishes the phenomenological mutation. ‘Such powerful and original phi-
losophy as Heidegger’s, even though it is in many respects different from
Husserlian phenomenology, is to some extent only its continuation’ (xxxiv).
Whilst in TIH, Levinas opposes Husserl, as a representational thinker,
to the Heideggerian ontologically grounded philosophy, in the following
texts the association of Dasein to Sein is also exposed as a destructive line
of thought. Nevertheless, Heidegger constitutes in 1930 the ground for the
critical reading of Husserl’s representational consciousness.
12 TIH, p. 134.
respect Husserl’s phenomenology is not free from the theory of

knowledge’; or ‘in any event, the concrete phenomenological analy-
ses elaborated by Husserl belong almost exclusively to the phenom-
enology of knowledge’13. But what is at stake in the reading operated
by Levinas within Husserl’s text?
As we have remarked before, the problem arising acutely in
the context of Levinas’s interpretation is rooted in the rejection of
representational intentionality. Levinas does not attempt to offer a
faithful and unfailing descriptive account of Husserl’s phenomenol-
ogy, but exposes critically the problems emerging from his reading
of Ideas I: ‘We have tried to mark out these elements, going some-
times beyond the letter of Husserl’s theory’14. The negative, critical
part of Husserl’s text is, for Levinas, related to the pre-eminence of
the theoretical life, which is synthetical and abstractive. The solu-
tion for overcoming this problem is revealed by the articulation of
phenomenology as a theory of being insofar as ‘the aesthetic and
ethical categories are also constitutive of being’15. Therefore, the
tension between the ontological and the representational dimen-
sion of phenomenology unveils, in fact, Levinas’s effort to play a
positive hermeneutics of phenomenology, grounded in the question
related to the meaning of being, against a negative interpretation
of phenomenology as theory of knowledge, epistemology. From
this perspective, ontology is the opening way for ‘the affirmation
of the intentional character of the practical and axiological life’16.
Volitional, ethical, aesthetic elements are introduced in order to
disrupt and to oppose cognitive, theoretical representations.
13 TIH, p. 134.
14 TIH, p. 134.
15 TIH, p. 158.
16 TIH, p. 158.
Factuality: beyond theory and things themselves

The exposition of the factuality and historicity of beings rep-
resents a significant dimension escaping the theoretical stasis of
Husserl’s intellectualism. The supra-historical and static attitude of
the phenomenological reflection does not take into consideration
man’s concrete life, ‘the ties which relate intuition to all the vital
forces which define concrete existence’17. It is therefore the his-
torical situation of man that Levinas attempts to oppose this time
to reflection, which ‘considers everything sub specie aeternitatis’.
Rejecting reflection, Levinas turns to the historicity of man as
the situation that contradicts the register of the reflective delay. It
seems, thus, that singularity is to be grasped only in terms of a con-
tinuous fading away, which is not synthesised in a representational
unity. Eternity has, for the early Levinas, the terrifying image of an
inert tautology. Therefore, the debate against Husserl is directed
more towards the inability to adhere to the things themselves, than
to the intentional dimension of phenomenology. Attacking repre-
sentation, Levinas attempts to go back to the immediate presence
of life as factual, which the scientific imperative in phenomenology
discards. Levinas maintains his interest for phenomenology, but the
appearing has to be considered as an event of being, as a rupture
in the economy of identification. There is a close relation between
phenomenology, as a method, and its inevitable involvement with
being, insofar as givenness points to both its constitutive pole and
its intended being. The intentional structure of consciousness has
to be, hence, opened to the realm of being in its givenness. Yet, the
context of being is prior to the intentional, sense-bestowing activity
of the ego. Levinas appears to go into the ontological commitment
of the natural attitude, viewed in its dimension as everyday life, and
force the operative to become thematic. Life, which is here the realm
17 TIH, p. 155.
of singularity, is not only an affective intentional givenness, but also

that which is to remain in the shadow of reflection. Consequently, if
Levinas emphasises the non-reflective aspects of intentionality - which
he presents as the way out of a restrictive appropriation of Husserl
(‘there is here a Husserlian possibility that can be developed beyond
what Husserl himself asserts’)18 - it is because he wants to offer a dis-
tinct status to living experience. At the same time, Levinas makes an
effort to distance himself from the preference accorded by Husserl to
the doxic thesis, which ascribes prevalence to representation within in-
tentionality. In this sense, the imperative rejection of representational
thought as exclusively regulating the intentional life of consciousness,
is also a key-aspect of Levinas’s appropriation of Husserl. It inscribes
the search for alternative grounds that can challenge the reduction of
intentionality to reflection.
Hence, Levinas exposes the negative dimension of the theoreti-
cal intentional act that leads to a supra-historical stance, which disre-
gards the concrete situation of man and its factual reality. Theory, or
representation, constitutes ‘a pure, disinterested contemplation which
considers things as “merely things”’19. In this context, the first non-
hermeneutical Levinasian texts attempt to bring to light the formation
of subjectivity as separated from this static and anonymous position
captured by theory in Husserl’s phenomenology. Levinas strives to
mobilise factual consciousness against existence, another form of in-
difference that resembles theory. There is a striking similarity between
‘things as <merely things>’, theory and existence. Things exist in a
manner different from that of consciousness: this thesis is explicitly
asserted by Husserl himself, but only within the regime of givenness.
Accordingly, the first essays stating Levinas’s original philosophical
style are to be directed towards the uncovering of the very mode of ex-
istence of subjectivity20. ‘Saving the dignity of man, compromised by
18 EI, p. 27.
19 TIH, p. 128.
20 In his book, Le sujet chez Emmanuel Lévinas (Paris, PUF, 1994), G. Bailhache
things’ 21- this is one of the major evading efforts that Levinas depicts
in Existence and Existents. On Evasion discloses precisely this contract
that existence has concluded with things, since existence is the way
things exist22, ‘this behaviour of the creature which is contented with
the accomplished fact of creation’23. It is interesting to note that, if in
his ontological reading of Husserl, Levinas takes as a model the life
of things as resisting reflective appropriation and imposing distancia-
tion, in the subsequent writings ontology is put under question as be-
ing itself a form of domination by the neutral. In this case, things are
nothing more than a form of passivity that sacrifices itself in favour
of acceptance. It is this contract of acceptance that Levinas refuses
insofar as existence is an ultimate and more obtrusive synthesis. Being
neutralises uniqueness and imposes commonality. Singularity is, thus,
in search of a locus, of a place of its own.
2. Hypostasis: the singularity of the here

Escaping existence
The abstractive dimension of existence formulates the context
for the creation of a spontaneous being. Evading existence is the
attempt made by an existent to appropriate existence. In this sense,
evasion marks the end of the dominance of existence, of all ontolo-
offers a very extensive account of the evolution of Levinas’s ideas on the issue
of subjectivity, from his early to his late texts. Through an intense preoccu-
pation with the definition of subjectivity, Levinas is among those that raise
questions on the conditions of the so-called ‘death of the subject’.
21 EE, p. 45.
22 ‘les choses –modèle premier de l’être’ (De l’ évasion, DE, p. 124). Or ‘cette
catégorie de la suffisance est concue sur l’image de l’être telle que nous
l’offrent les choses. Elles sont.’ (DE, p. 93.)
23 DE, p. 125.
gisms24 that have contaminated our understanding25. The need for

evasion is dictated by existence, which represents an absolute synthe-
sis, and a tautological form captured in the image of things. Evasion
(évasion) is not synonymous with escape (fuite), which is limited to
the need of reaching another destination26. It is not becoming, which
is still too attached to the idea of growing in accordance with a cer-
tain fate. Evasion is the pure need of finding a way out of existence;
it is the immediate ‘excendance’ that death cannot accomplish. It is
not the ‘ontic’ response of a finite existent, tormented by the effort of
overcoming its fundamental penury. The pursuit of a perpetual self-
enrichment is extrinsic to evasion because the need to evade cannot
be satisfied. The malaise which determines evasion is acute suffering,
a feeling of insufficiency that no remedy can ease.
Substantiality is the true imprisonment that Levinas attempts
to evade, the passivity of one’s self as a self, another face of existence
resembling things. Going out of oneself is therefore a movement
24 Heidegger is the first philosopher to be exposed by this critique directed
towards fundamental ontology
25 J.-L. Marion (‘Note sur l’indifférence ontologique’, in L’ éthique comme phi-
losophie première, Paris, Cerf, 1993, pp. 47-63) remarks that the rejection of
ontology can be interpreted, in relation to Levinas’s early texts, as reversing
the ontological difference, manifesting the privilege of beings over Being.
However, in Levinas’s latter work, the rapport between Sein and Seiende is
replaced by an ethical, rather than ontological difference. This new differ-
ence is pre-original and appears as a result of a phenomenological reduc-
tion to the Saying. To this distinction, we can parallel that between the
singularity of the self as hypostasis, and the singularity of the subject in the
ethical the-other-in-the-same.
26 The term ‘escape’ is inadequately used by John Llewelyn (Emmanuel Levi-
nas: the Genealogy of Ethics, London, Routledge, 1995, p.11) to characterise
evasion, since Levinas distinguishes between evasion and fuite. Evasion is
not the need of going out from a particular way of existence but from the
imprisonment of existence as such. Escape is, on the contrary, the horrified
reaction towards a specific definition of our existence, neediness of refuge.
Cf. DE, p. 96.
without destination, dynamical affliction provoked by existence.

As a way of evading existence, Levinas looks at pleasure to capture
more accurately the restless of need. Pleasure is a dynamic empty-
ing of oneself, a movement of diffusion, and a constant exceeding
of the identity of the enchained self. It is never complete, but un-
derway towards an ever more intense relaxation of the passive and
substantial self. Pleasure is affectivity that undermines the forms of
existence, and an explosion of its limitation. It is a promise of de-
substantiation. But this phenomenological description of pleasure
insinuates at the same time a fundamental deficiency: pleasure is
just a deceitful evasion27. Even if it is a continuous relaxation of
the self, pleasure never keeps its promise, but unfolds as shame.
The paroxysm of pleasure is the insinuation of shame as the impos-
sibility of evading one’s self and the incapacity of covering one’s
nakedness. Exposed as pure attachment to itself, the self is naked,
delivered again to its own malaise and tautological existence. The
burden of this uneasiness is described by Levinas through the expe-
rience of nausea, which is the identical presence to oneself, sickness
provoked by the density of existence. Therefore, lack and privation
do not dictate the need of evasion, which is, in fact, provoked by
plenitude and pure identity. Furthermore, since existence has no
commencement, it is impossible to evade it dialectically through a
prior ontological ‘contract’.
The hypostatic existent

The first veritable attempt to evade existence is illustrated in
Existence and Existents (1947) where the dominance of beings by Being
is reversed within a register prior to reflection28. As a result, hypostasis
27 Cf. DE, p. 110.
28 Existence and Existents does not strictly circumscribe the difference between
‘existence’/’existents’ and ‘being’/’beings’. Throughout, Levinas suggests a
certain symmetry regarding both these discursive categories. It is only to-
is exposed as a possibility to posit subjectivity and neutralise Being.

The hypostatic existent takes over its existence suspending the ‘suffo-
cating embrace’ of Being29. This evasion, ontic accomplishment of the
obsession that Levinas’s earlier work asserted, is not an escape, but ‘an
evasion without an itinerary and without an end, [which] is not trying
to come ashore somewhere’ 30. It is rather the primordial stance of the
subject and the existent’s original possession of its own self.
Existence is associated, in this work, with the impersonal reality
of the there is, ‘heavy atmosphere belonging to no one, universal’31.
This anonymous presence comes before the acknowledged existence
of the world. It is the nocturnal presence of a horrifying absence,
formless and indefinite. Levinas relates the indeterminacy of the there
is to the obsessive dimension of nocturnal vigilance, of insomnia.
This watchfulness is not conscious attentiveness, or the result of a lib-
erated existent who controls its reactions. It is rather the exhausting
presence of anonymity that invades the existent’s nocturnal experi-
ence. Watching the void of the night which it cannot suspend, the
existent is eradicated by the impersonal being.
There is a nocturnal space, but it is no longer empty space, the
transparency which both separates us from things and gives us
wards the end of the essay that he undermines this unequivocal relation,
preferring to oppose existence to beings. ‘To the notion of existence, where
the emphasis is put on the first syllable, we are opposing the notion of a
being whose very advent is a folding back upon itself’ (EE, p.81). In this
sense, the stance of subjectivity is not ecstasy but a positing effort of auto-
formation. However, the opposition ‘existence’—‘existents’ is a projective
one insofar as the freedom of the hypostasis gives birth to an existent cap-
tured within itself, to a new form of tautology. Thus the hypostasis presents
itself as similar to there is.
29 EE, p. 23.
30 EE, p. 25.
31 EE, p. 58.
access to them, by which they are given. Darkness fills it like a

content; it is full, but full of the nothingness of everything.32
Within this impersonal vigilance, the existent shapes its own
hypostasis33. Striving against a paralysing existence is an effort to
constitute a self-identical existent. If later works focus on the de-
manding face-to-face relationship that the radical exteriority of the
other commands, the originality of Existence and Existents is to turn
to the singularity of the existent. The aversion of the existent with
regard to existence is captured within subjective moments that
emerge as fugitive responses of a horrified existent. Lassitude, indo-
lence, fatigue are all subjective events that announce concrete exis-
tents, who exceed the anonymous tautology of existence. Lassitude
is one of the modalities that signal the receding existent. Its imme-
diate reality affirms the inability of the existent to embrace the ab-
solute weigh of existing, the refusal to bow to the ‘commitment to
exist’34. Lassitude is an aversion towards the ‘unrevokable contract’
that constrains the existent to capitulate before its auto-positing ef-
fort. In the same register, indolence is ‘neither idleness nor rest’, but
again an interruption of existence. ‘Indolence, as a recoil before ac-
tion, is a hesitation before existence, an indolence about existing’35.
At this point, there is a significant indication that temporality is
absent before the other is revealed: ‘the future, a virginal instant,
is impossible in a solitary subject’36. Time and the Other (1946/47)
32 EE, p. 58.
33 It is of a major significance to underline the equivalence of the nocturnal
with the non-representational insofar as, in the latter work, the face of the
other is described as a ‘nocturnal event’ (TI, p. 28). The light is therefore
the image of knowledge, of the constitutive thought, as opposed to the
non-conceptual presence of the face of the other.
34 EE, p. 24.
35 EE, p. 28.
36 EE, p. 29.
opens with the same statement: ‘time is not the accomplished fact
of an isolated and solitary subject (…), but the relation itself of the
subject with the other’37. However, in Existence and Existents, indo-
lence is defined as withdrawal from future, as the existent’s positive
attempt to delimit itself as existing here. Fatigue, another modality
of refusal regarding the anonymity of Being, is a repudiation of
the active existence that compels the subjective existent to act. It is
tied to a present which resists the mechanical growth of existence.
In this sense, the present has pre-eminence in the formation of the
existent. It constitutes the matrix which generates what Levinas
acknowledges, further on in the text, as hypostasis. ‘The present is
then a situation in being where there is not only being in general,
but there is a being, a subject’38. What is refused here is in fact
temporality in the form of synthesis. Indeed, the introduction of
the other as diachronic does not generate temporal flowing, but, on
the contrary, the unacceptability of a location in time. Exceeding
time in the infinite specification of an instant, hypostasis is that
which cannot be synthesised, the subjective singularity that can-
not be repeated. The instant as present is a radical separation from
commonality with other moments in time. The existent rejects
temporality, which brings moments together and creates history. In
a later text, history is viewed as the prototypical image of synthesis:
‘totalisation is accomplished only in history’39. Or, ‘the birth of a
37 TA, p. 17.
38 EE, p. 73. ‘On Evasion’ also expresses Levinas’s reticence towards eternity
— one of the faces of the anonymous existence: ‘eternity is nothing but the
accentuation or radicalisation of the fatality of a being turned upon itself’
(DE, p. 123). In his early work, Levinas stresses the major significance of
the present and constructs the auto-positing existent as evading from its
own historicity. The instant, or the present, is the primordial moment of
the hypostasis; eternity and duration are, in this sense, means of neutralis-
ing the existents.
39 TI, p. 55.
separated being …is an event historically absurd’40. Accordingly,

the singularity of the face of the other will refuse history and its
synthetic domination. However, as far as hypostasis is concerned,
the instant is the refuge against the production of historical time.
The decline of hypostasis

Introducing the confrontation against inauthentic existence,
the subjective modes precede the focus on the self-sufficiency of the
world. In his early work, Levinas considers the world to be another
defence against the oppressive existence, defied by lassitude, indo-
lence, and fatigue. The existent in the world is a specific situation
of withdrawal from existence. ‘In the ontological adventure, the
world is an episode which, far from deserving to be called a fall, has
its own equilibrium, harmony and positive ontological function:
the possibility of extracting oneself from anonymous being’41. The
world constitutes, for an existent, the possibility of being released
from the burden of existence. Instead of being possessed by exis-
tence, the existent encounters the world at distance from its own
being. Thus, acknowledged as ‘outside’, the world sets the existent
as a separated being. ‘It is an inwardness’, as Levinas points out,
which excludes the suffocating adherence to existence42. The posi-
tive connotation of the world is significant insofar as being in the
world introduces a dimension of sincerity that can generate light,
knowledge. At this point, Levinas identifies a certain ambiguity or,
more precisely, a circular escape from existence since the world as
given makes possible the departure from existence, but is, at the same
time, the locus of a contract with things. Knowing is consciousness,
light and, therefore, autonomy. From this perspective, consciousness
40 TI, p. 56.
41 EE, p. 45.
42 EE, p. 47.
is not the assimilating domination of thought, but rather a force

rejecting the anonymity of existence, inciting the formation of an
existent’s identity. Knowing ‘is a way of relating to events while still
being able to not be caught up in them. To be a subject is to be
a power of unending withdrawal, an ability to find oneself behind
what happens to us’43. But the autonomy that the existent discov-
ers in the world is still an illusion because the world is, in reality, a
moment in the ‘relationship an existent maintains with existence,
through the light, which both fills up, and maintains, the interval’
created within existence44. In order to be able to elude the fatality of
existence, a subject has to be created. Nevertheless, consciousness is
already contaminated by existence, reabsorbed into a universal stance.
Levinas takes a step further in the assertion of a dimension prior to
consciousness: ‘we are, thus, introducing into the impersonal event
of the there is not the notion of consciousness, but of wakefulness, in
which consciousness participates, affirming itself as a consciousness
because it only participates in it.’45
A brief observation should be integrated here since the crystal-
lisation of hypostasis exhibits a crucial similarity to Michel Henry’s
description of immanent subjectivity. From the immanence of abso-
lute subjectivity to knowledge or ec-stasis: this is the consequential
decline that Henry exposes throughout his genealogy of psycho-
analysis46. Knowledge is a purely derivative aspect, second in its on-
tological status, based on a prior and immediate self-sensing, which
the Cartesian cogito exposes. This auto-affection determines every
cognitive effort that comes after the radical immanence of subjectiv-
ity. Levinas addresses the same issue when he expresses his approba-
tion regarding ‘the most profound teaching of the Cartesian cogito’.
43 EE, p. 49.
44 EE, p. 51.
45 EE, p. 66.
46 M.Henry, The Genealogy of Psychoanalysis, Stanford University Press, Cali-
fornia, 1993.
This is to be located in the disclosure of a stance prior to conscious-

ness, or knowledge:
there is something that stands out against knowing, that is a
condition for knowing. The knowing of knowing is also here; it
somehow emerges from a material density, a protuberance, from
a head. Thought, which instantaneously spreads into the world,
retains the possibility of collecting itself into the here, from which
it never detached itself.47
The definition of subjectivity48 as hypostasis, or here asserts the
originality of Existence and Existents. After the tormenting insomnia
and the confrontation against the formless night, the sleep occurs
as retreat inside hypostasis. The presence of the world and the in-
quisitive relation to things that seemed to suspend, in an ambigu-
ous way, the indifferent reification of the existent, are reconsidered
in the context of a preceding position. Consciousness, knowledge,
light - the ground of cognition is the subject, this original ‘curling
up’ into oneself that only the here49 can generate50.
47 EE, p. 68.
48 Jocelyn Benoist identifies in Existence and Existents a significant ‘reinven-
tion of the subject’ (Positivité et transcendance, PUF, Paris, 2000, pp. 105-
22). The Levinasian subject is a re-appropriation of the Cartesian cogito
insofar as hypostasis constitutes precisely this original ground on which
the prophecy of the Other can be approached. The primary stance of the
subject is a ‘silent cogito’, a position that reveals a dimension of egotism,
which is the foundation of every ethical claim.
49 Levinas distinguishes his description of the here from Heidegger’s Da that al-
ready presupposes the world (EE, p. 71). The position that Levinas depicts is
anterior to being in the world, is pure immanence in the sense Henry affirms it.
50 It is interesting to reveal another proximity with Henry’s conception of the hu-
man body. Levinas addresses the problem of inwardness correlated to hypos-
tasis, in the context of a positive appropriation of the dimension that the body
brings to light. In this sense, Levinas affirms that ‘I am my pain, my breathing,
my organs, that I do not only have a body, but am a body’ that is to say that the
body is the premise of the hypostasis; it ‘is position itself’. (EE, p. 72).
Consciousness comes out of rest, out of a position, out of this

unique relationship with a place. Position is not added to con-
sciousness like an act that it decides on; it is out of position, out
of an immobility, that consciousness comes to itself51.
The analysis of hypostasis is a unique form of exposing the
singular dimension of the existent. The interpretation of evasion
as the pursuit of a self-referential existent is exceptional. Levinas
reflects on it, but associates it at once with a solitary existent. In
this sense, the subjective positing of the existent is provisional with
regard to the concluding dimension that Existence and Existents un-
veils. The hypostasis turns against itself, as the identification that
the stance of the existent generates becomes an inability to detach
from oneself. The other reveals itself and confers meaning to the
solitary existent. In this sense, the present is no longer only the
privileged moment of the auto-positing existent, but the equiva-
lent of an oppressive identity. The other is already disclosed in the
responsibility that the liberating present brings to light. The hypos-
tasis, disengaged from the tautological existence, turns into a heavy
lethality since the present institutes a menacing incapability to go
out of itself. As a result, the pure freedom of the present has to be
converted into responsibility: ‘the freedom of the present finds a
limit in the responsibility for which it is the condition’52. The hy-
postasis is, thus, tautological and has to be recuperated at a higher
level, where the singularity of the existent can undo its enclosure.
In this sense, it seems that Levinas finds it impossible to sustain
singularity within the instant without falling into a claustrophobic
identity with oneself.
51 EE, p. 70.
52 EE, p. 79.
Singularity: Being/beings without ‘nomos’

It is also interesting to note the fact that, if for Husserl the here
of the ego is, to a certain extent, characterised as anonymity since it
creates location by its own ‘dis-location’, in the case of hypostasis the
necessity of having a name has priority over existence. For Levinas,
Being is itself an event: it is not a genus, and it cannot be specified;
it is, in a sense, singular. The anonymity of existence resembles, in
fact, the absolute flow in Husserl’s phenomenology. Being is char-
acterised as existing, as being relational, but ‘only by analogy’, since
it is a mere lack of separation, an embrace that suffocates. As in
Husserl’s texts, aporia reinstalls itself within discourse: the existent
that separates itself from Being has to be in order to conquer its
existence. Beings have to adhere to existence, so that separation can
be produced, and this adherence is synthetic and brings together
existents (they are). The same difficulties regarding a relation with
‘being in general’ are to be found in Heidegger’s analysis of exis-
tence. Thus, ‘Heidegger posits in advance this ground of being as
the horizon on which every existent arises, as though the horizon
(…) were the ultimate structure of relationship’53. Similarly, for
Levinas, the dominance of existence simulates the order of a syn-
thesis. The ‘as though’ does not point here to the illusive character
of a determination, nor to a mere analogical characterisation. This
expression rather stresses the ambivalence of existence: the idea of
an existence being singular and a synthesis at the same time. The
decision54 to make existence a failed singularity is also demonstrated
by the image of evil55 that Levinas imposes into his argument. This
53 TI, p. 68.
54 In this respect, one can point to an ethical-theoretical decision, in Der-
rida’s terms, that relates the texts to a pre-decision at work in Levinas’s
philosophy.
55 Cf. C. Chalier (‘Ontologie et mal’, in L’ éthique comme philosophie première,
text is, in reality, a constant surpassing of the descriptive56, pointing

beyond pure givenness and phenomenological legitimacy. Indeed,
the horror that marks the encounter of existence illustrates a certain
negativity, which, as Franck observes, ‘while supporting Levinas’s
work, is never justified. (…) Insofar as the malignancy of Being,
which renders ethically necessary an excendence towards the Good
will not have been ontologically established – the entire effort risks
promoting a false departure’57. In this respect, the problem of origin,
which is so acute in Husserl’s investigation, is resolved by Levinas in a
dogmatic gesture: existence is prior to the formation of existents, and
presents itself, in an obsessive manner, as already given. Existence is
evil and its suffocating presence generates the necessity of a locus.
But is not Levinas imprisoned in an aporetic situation: how to decide
between an existence that is and an existent that exists? Besides, what
characterises existence is precisely the fact that it clings to existents:
‘existence is not properly speaking a term, is not a substantive, and
instead of being at a distance adheres to the I’58. So, the problematic
relation between the constituting and the constituted exposes again
the same dilemma: how can an origin be positively given by its nega-
tive separation from that which it originates? Without offering an
answer, Levinas’s description of the hypostasis seems to produce an
impossible relation between two singularities: a delusive and invad-
ing one and a fragile subjectivity, which risks relapsing again into
being. It is this conflicting picture that makes Levinas introduce an
Paris, Cerf, 1993, pp.63-79) suggests the presence of two images of evil in
Levinas’s work. That is, the evil of existence, or of the ‘there is’, and that of
the malignant essence, or of the egoism in the form of a conatus essendi.
56 This aspect will be developed in greater detail in the conclusive part of this
chapter.
57 D. Franck, ‘The Body of Difference’ in The Face of the Other & the Trace of God
(J. Bloechl ed., New York, Fordham University Press, 2000, pp. 3-29), p. 16.
58 EE, p. 47.
ultimate synthesis. A deeper synthetic co-presence is installed be-

tween existence and existents. The effort to distinguish a singular
that is otherwise than being, that is to say, a singular that has not
already contracted its existence, remains inscribed in the subsequent
work as a question still waiting for an answer. In this sense, Levinas
suggests that it is only the other that refuses a ‘common frontier’59,
while offering the possibility of a relation without relation. Contrary
to existence, the veritable singular has to be something with which I
do not have any ‘common ground’. In fact, a singular cannot even be
identified as such since, ‘in these recuperations [retrouvailles]’, which
identification produces, singularity becomes a mere ‘ideality’60. In
this sense, identification is already a reinstallation of synthesis. But
how is the other different from existence, and what makes its singu-
larity a veritable one?
3. Breaching totality
As we have seen previously, Levinas’s account of singularity is

described through the formation of an independent existent in re-
lation to an anonymous existence. Reacting against Husserl’s syn-
thetic phenomenology, Levinas turns, at first, to being in order to
escape the comparative nature of constitutional thought. However,
in his subsequent writings, existence itself becomes insufficient and
has to be opposed in order to make possible another form of singu-
larity. The accent is put on separation and instability, and Levinas
has to constantly create a more intense specification that cannot
turn into identity. In his later texts, this separating move is taken
even further. Existence is not acceptable any more, because it gen-
erates identification and synthetic proximity to beings. Hypostasis
59 TI, p. 39.
60 ‘Language et Proximité’ (in DEHH, pp. 217-36), p. 222.
risks also to become repetitive and to reiterate a synthetic type of

genesis, similar to Husserl’s habitual ego. That is why separation
needs to be radicalised. But the main role in this more reductive
phenomenology is no longer conferred to existence or to existents,
but to the other. So, let us see how a phenomenology of singularity
is constructed around this image of the other.
Totality and the other

Faithful to the main phenomenological dictum, Levinas asserts,
in ‘Language and Proximity’, that ‘it is out of its meaning that a
being manifests itself as being’61. Correlated to this remark, the
commentary on Husserl, which embodies a summary of the phe-
nomenological method, is highly relevant: ‘to Husserl, the fact of
meaning is characterised by the phenomenon of identification’, ‘the
identity of a unity across multiplicity’62. Reacting to this doctrine,
based on synthetical consciousness, Levinas identifies the radical
meaning of singularity in the ‘relation’ with the other. Without
establishing any correlation, or potential reversibility, Levinas pro-
ceeds to a description of the stranger that resists the system. The
phenomenological root of the description is stated in clear terms
at the onset of the investigation: ‘we know this relation only in
the measure that we effect it (…). Alterity is possible only start-
ing from me’63. The role of the constitutive subject remains, thus,
an important factor in the ‘passage to the limit’ that is involved
in the relation with the other. In this sense, Levinas affirms that
‘the description of this relation is the central issue of the present
research’64. In line with these ideas, the other is described as a com-
61 DEHH, p. 218.
62 DEH, p. 59.
63 TI, p. 39.
64 TI, p. 42.
plete defeat of any totality and of all syntheses. He is ‘irreducible

to the distance the synthetic activity of understanding establishes
between the diverse terms’65, and an absolute that no concept can
encompass. The other is also without a genus, a singular that can-
not be designated by means of a third term, or of a neutral. In this
sense, the other cannot be neutralised. ‘The totality, in which this
singularity vanishes’66, is the most menacing and destructive rap-
port to the other. From this perspective, the other is said to be an
absolute exteriority that no participation can contaminate. Uniting
the same and the other into a whole is impossible: alterity cannot
present any common elements with the same.
The idea of infinity

The description of this relation, which defies its own definition,
is forged in relation to the Cartesian idea of infinity presented in
the Third Meditation, in which the ideatum is said to surpass its
idea. The distance formed between the two constitutes the very
content of the ideatum67. It is by means of this image that Levinas
attempts to offer a descriptive account of the other. It is interesting
to note that a certain experience of inadequacy, which resembles
Husserl’s exposition of the other ego as phenomenal impossibility,
is to be underlined. The idea of infinity that Levinas uses for his
own description points to the questionable nature of givenness in
the case of the other. At the same time, this idea exposes a certain
exceptionality that is included in the encounter of the other. The
terms that Levinas applies to the idea of infinity pertain immedi-
ately to paradoxes: ‘a thought that at each instant thinks more than
65 TI, p. 39.
66 TI, p. 59.
67 TI, p. 50.
it thinks’68. It is relevant to notice the insistence on the impos-

sibility of a temporal synthesis, as infinity is a sudden excess that
cannot be recuperated in temporal contexts. Nonetheless, Levinas’s
appeal to the idea of infinity brings a religious motif into his phe-
nomenological description. That is to say, for Descartes, infinity is
an exceptional idea that relates to an infinite being, i.e. God. By
making use of this theme, Levinas seems to confuse the strict phe-
nomenological description with the religious implications present
in the idea of infinity. Furthermore, the resistance to totality as syn-
thesis can be expressed only in paradoxical formulae. Thus, my idea
of the other is such that ‘in it the After or the Effect conditions the
Before or the Cause: the Before appears and is only welcomed’69.
In terms that are similar to the manner in which Husserl describes
time-consciousness, or Derrida his notion of gift, Levinas reveals
the difficulty of encompassing the givenness of the one that refuses
givenness. The relation with the other is, thus, that of a ‘subjectivity
that comes into contact [entre en contact] with a singularity that
excludes identification through the ideal’, i.e. ‘an absolute singu-
larity and as such non-representational’70. This singularity ‘cannot
appear’, but is merely ‘invisible’71. Or, stated otherwise, ‘infinity
signifies precisely that which falls short [en-deça] of its manifesta-
tion’72, its visibility.
A naked phenomenology
The other is, in Levinas’s attempt to provide a positive account
of singularity, absolute foreignness, ‘refractory to every typology,
68 TI, p. 62.
69 TI, p. 54.
70 DEHH, p. 225.
71 DEHH, p. 224.
72 DQVI, p. 109.
to every genus, to every characterology, to every classification’73.

The other cannot be qualified since naming an attribute would sig-
nify imposing commonality between him and other entities74. It
is in this respect that Levinas emphasises the naked nature of the
other, suggesting that a descriptive speech is already a betrayal of
the strangeness of the other. But the impossibility of naming him
is not a negative retreat that defines itself in opposition to abun-
dance. The imprisonment of every affirmative activity becomes a
meta-affirmation, which needs to cancel any rapport to previous
verbality. The other is excess and overflowing, announcing himself
through expression. It is interesting to note that Levinas continu-
ally uses signification to describe the experiencing of the inability
to grasp the other. The connection with Husserl’s phenomenology
is feeble though, since the signification that the other brings forth
is not itself the meaning of transcendence. For Levinas the other
institutes the possibility of signification: ‘the other is the principle
of phenomena’75. The birth of language, not as a material structure,
but as an attitude towards the world, is related to the epiphany of
the other. As Levinas notes, ‘the essence of language is the relation
with the other’76. However, sense bestowing is always preceded by
the radical signification imposed by the face of the other. It seems,
thus, that the other is not only pre-phenomenal, but is the origin of
phenomenality, of vision. The first gesture in the constitutive act is,
therefore, the offering of the world by the same, the thematic stat-
ing of the world in front of the other77. The economic self affirms
its isolation in the thematising of things that are no longer dedicat-
ed to usage: ‘the thing becomes a theme. To thematise is to offer the
73 TI, p. 73.
74 TI, p. 74.
75 TI, p. 92.
76 TI, p. 207.
77 TI, p. 99.
world to the other in speech’78. But does the other have a phenom-
enal appearing? On this point Levinas prefers to evoke a certain
sense of ambiguity79 that tends to be equivalent to the meaning
of the other. Firstly, the other is said to be ‘more primordal than
everything that takes place in me’80. However, this priority is not
temporal since the receiving of the face of the other necessitates an
independent being, an autonomous self that enjoys its own separa-
tion. At the same time, the world itself has antecedence in the expe-
rience of ‘living from…’ as the ground that nourishes the economic
self81. As a result, ‘the transcendence of the other is not enacted
outside the world’, or, in other words, ‘the relationship with the
other is not produced outside the world’82. But if the ethical event
of the other presupposes the existence of a world, where the sub-
ject enjoys its egoist being, is the other encountered as part of the
mundane realm? Levinas seems to suggest an affirmative answer:
‘the face, still a thing among things, breaks through the form that
nevertheless delimits it’83. But, ‘in the sensible appearance of the
face’, there is an overflowing that points to a beyond, or an above.
Indeed, ‘to manifest oneself as a face is to impose oneself above and
beyond the manifested and purely phenomenal form, to present
oneself in a mode irreducible to manifestation’84. Consequently, we
can assert that the phenomenality of the face is made possible by
the excess of phenomenality, by the presence of an absence, by the
78 TI, p. 209.
79 Cf. J. Rolland (‘L’ambiguité comme façon de l’autrement’, in L’ éthique
comme philosophie première, Paris, Cerf, 1993, pp. 427-445) for the
superiority of this concept in relation to ‘enigma’ or ‘equivocation’.
80 TI, p. 87.
81 TI, p. 127.
82 TI, pp. 172-173.
83 TI, p. 198.
84 TI, p. 200.
paradox that manifesting the invisible presupposes. The other is,

to a certain extent, a phenomenon if by phenomenon one under-
stands ‘the being that appears, but remains absent’85. Committing
oneself to the idea of a prior being that engenders the givenness of
the phenomenal, one can accept that the face as visible, its plastic
image, is the result of a reality that precedes it. In this case, it is true
that ‘the face I welcome makes me pass from phenomenon to being
in another sense’86. The other cannot be equated to the given, or be
reduced to the phenomenon. It points to a presence that is opera-
tive in the appearing, as the shadow that one cannot determine.
So, is Levinas suggesting that the other is in fact the origin of the
phenomenal, the operative shadow that Husserl could not thema-
tise, but implicitly accepted as prior to constitution? An affirmative
answer seems to impose itself.
Creatio ex nihilo
The other is irreducible to phenomenality; it is a surplus that
can be understood only in terms of creation87. Indeed, as Levinas
alleges, ‘that there could be a more than being, or an above being
is expressed in the idea of creation’88. The image of the creatio ex
nihilo is amply employed for the description of the other. The rela-
tion to the other, which gives meaning to the egoist being that indi-
viduates itself in enjoyment, expresses, similarly to the creative move,
‘a multiplicity not united into a totality’, ‘posits a being outside of
every system’89. The miraculous face to face is, in fact, the relation
85 TI, p. 181.
86 TI, p. 178.
87 For a more detailed analysis of the notion of ‘creation’ in Levinas’s phi-
losophy, cf. for instance S. Petrosino, ‘L’idée de la création dans l’oeuvre de
Lévinas’ (La différence comme non-indifférence, A.Münster ed., Paris, Kimé,
1995, pp. 97-109).
88 TI, p. 218.
89 TI, p. 104.
of the origin to the originated, a movement that affirms the terms

as separated and independently, but yet in a relation that absolves
itself. Levinas also uses other religious connotations: the other is the
Master that teaches, is an absolute being ‘withdrawn from catego-
ries’90, it is addressed through ‘his eminence, his height, his lordship’,
‘his sanctity’91. Moreover, the relation between the same and the
other is defined by Levinas as ‘religion’92, relation with ‘the Master’,
‘the Perfect’93. Likewise, is not the Cartesian cogito referring to God,
whereas for Levinas it is the other that ensures that the individuation
of the same becomes possible94? ‘God is the other’95 and the bibli-
cal associations can be prolonged to the other manifesting his face
through language. Creation, the naming of the things that institutes
meaning, the other as ‘the height from which language comes’96…
But is interpreting Levinas in a manner which the ambiguity of his
texts would justify not synonymous with oversimplifying the chal-
lenge of his analyses? Is classifying not annulling an attempt to im-
pose a phenomenological discourse on singularity? Besides, there is
textual evidence that conflicts with the above-mentioned position.
Indeed, Levinas affirms that the same has to relate to the other ‘as
an atheist’97, i.e. as a self that is not subjugated by sacred overpow-
90 TI, p. 71.
91 TI, p. 77.
92 TI, p. 80.
93 TI, p. 86.
94 Discussing the relevance of Levinas’s texts for the contemporary ethical de-
bate, R. Visker (Truth and Singularity, Dordrecht, Kluwer, 1999) considers
that ‘God’ is the name that guarantees Levinas’s account of the absolute
other. Warning against Levinas’s power of seduction, Visker offers a con-
structive criticism that unveils the deep articulations of the ethical other and
its consequences for issues such as racism. For reasons that have already been
evoked in our study, we consider that this assimilation is too precipitate.
95 TI, p. 211.
96 TI, p. 171.
97 TI, p. 77.
ers or a dominating god. To quote him, ‘the uprightness of the face

to face – is necessary in order that the breach that leads to God be
produced’98. Consequently, it seems that the relation to the divine,
far from establishing the foundational rapport to the other, is, on the
contrary, rendered possible by the epiphany of the face of the other.
But, to return now to the starting point of our digression, is the other
phenomenal? Can we still discuss about the face of the other in phe-
nomenological terms?
‘Describing’ the other

Levinas uses generously the denomination of ‘description’
throughout his entire work. However, this description is sometimes
qualified as ‘invocation’99, or even ‘revelation’. The face itself is am-
biguously employed since ‘the whole body – a hand or a curve of the
shoulder – can express the face’100. Insofar as the face of the other is
expression, the distinction between the concrete image of the face
and other expressive, embodied parts is blurred. Furthermore, the
other himself, Levinas affirms, is not a particular other, a specific
individual as he cannot be an individuation of a genus (i.e. man)101.
So, can we rightfully point to a ‘phenomenology of the face’? Levinas
himself is evasive on this matter. Thus, in a discussion with Philippe
Nemo he declares: ‘I do not know if one can talk about a “phenom-
enology” of the face, since phenomenology describes what appears
(…). I think that the access to the face is rather, from the outset,
ethical’102. The reason is that the outside appearance can captivate
the self into a mere inquisitive gaze, instead of a receptive wel-
98 TI, p. 78.
99 TI, p. 295.
100 TI, p. 262.
101 TI, p. 226.
102 EI, p. 89.
coming. In this sense, the relation to the other cannot be reduced

to perception. Levinas goes even further: to a certain extent ‘the
face is not [truly] “seen”’103. What is, then, left of the imperative
to full description that phenomenology predicates? As we have al-
ready noticed, the other is the one that exceeds any category, any
commonality or synthetic grasp. The other cannot even be said to
have a restrictive limit that would bring him in the same category
with the self. Indeed, as Levinas maintains, ‘the limit separates and
unites in a whole’104. That is to say, the other cannot be opposed to,
or separated from anything else since conflicting, or delimitation
means introducing a wider totality. The singularity of the other
is, therefore, the surplus of the invisible, the unthinkable. But the
relation to the idea of givenness is still retained, ‘for the Other can-
not present himself as Other outside of my consciousness’105. Let
us leave, for the moment, the problem of the phenomenality of the
other unsolved in order to return to the manner in which singu-
larity can tolerate, and even request, for Levinas, the existence of
‘multiple singularities’106.
An economical singularity
In the elaboration of the ethical obligation towards the other,
Levinas commences by describing the singular nature of the face.
From our previous considerations, we have discovered that the
other announces himself in the phenomenal as pure expression.
However, even if Levinas emphasises mainly the exceptionality of
the other, the ethical optics that is unveiled in the epiphany of the
face is rooted in the positing of a secondary singularity. That is to
103 EI, p. 91.
104 TI, p. 222.
105 TI, p. 232.
106 TI, p. 251.
say, Levinas states as an obligatory condition for the singular ap-

pearing of the other, the enjoying self of the economical life. The
egoism that is mobilised in the nourishing, or ‘living from…’ situ-
ation points to the formation of a happy, singular self. This subject
does not recognise a real other, as the satisfaction of his economical
needs presupposes a continuous integration of the alien through
labour. Nevertheless, Levinas describes this self as a unique one, i.e.
as an I: ‘the unicity of the I does not merely consist in being found
in one sample only, but in existing without having a genus107,
without being the individuation of a concept’108. For the same, the
break-up of totality is realised through enjoyment and solitude.
Sensibility, which is the key-concept in the formation of the
singular I109, is opposed again to reason as the paradigm of syn-
thetic identification. However, if representation is a mode of re-
maining the same, of reiteration of the self, enjoyment itself risks
creating dependence with regard to the elemental and the nowhere
of the anonymous existence. As a matter of fact, enjoyment is, as in
Levinas’s earlier work, ambiguously delimited as a form of indigence,
as dependence of the self on the world that nourishes it. It is in this
sense that labour is a supplementing strategy that covers up a delay
in the constitution of an independent I. Nonetheless, the stance of
the economical self is habitation, being at home with oneself, in a
continuous self-reference. Sensibility, which is described as lack of
transcendence, or as pure immanence, produces ‘the very narrowness
107 J. Llewelyn contrasts, in a brief note, Aristotle’s particular, which is always
related to a genus, to Levinas’s defence of ‘a non-particular singularity’
(Emmanuel Levinas. The Genealogy of Ethics, p. 2).
108 TI, p. 117.
109 R. Visker notices that there are degrees of singularisation of the subject:
to the singular I in enjoyment, which is pre-ethical, Levinas annexes the
singularisation of the self in the responsibility for the other (op. cit., p. 332,
note 8).
of life’110, i.e. the naivety of the subject. Still, well into his description
of enjoyment as mode of the same, Levinas signals to his readers that
the economical I is not the concrete man as we really encounter him
in the everyday situational life111, where things are represented as
identity poles. It is as if a reduction of the natural attitude were made
operative in the discourse about the formation of the self.
The instant, as temporality of the singular, emerges once again in
the description of the same: ‘the I is produced as self-sufficiency and
is maintained in an instant torn up from the continuity of time’112.
In line with this idea, the self appears as dominated by the figure of
the eternal beginning, of the rupture of temporal synthesis by instan-
taneous joy: ‘the veritable position of the I in time consists in inter-
rupting time by punctuating it with beginnings’113. The description,
yet again, is purposefully paradoxical since the I is a sufficiency that
suffers from its non-sufficiency114, an autonomous and indigent self.
The separation that is created by the economic life of the same allows
the other to manifest itself as ‘shock’115. But, in order to describe the
arrival of the other, Levinas employs once more paradoxical formu-
lations: ‘in the separated being the door to the outside must hence
be at the same time open and closed’116. Or, ‘interiority must be at
the same time closed and open’117. Moreover, if a separated being is
necessary for the epiphany of the face, the other is, at the same time,
prior to and the root of separation. Nonetheless, the pluralism that
Levinas stresses in the ethical relation with the other is grounded on
110 TI, p. 138.
111 TI, p. 139.
112 TI, p. 143.
113 TI, p. 143.
114 TI, p. 142.
115 TI, p. 149.
116 TI, p. 148.
117 TI, p. 149.
a multiplicity of singularities. The multiple nature of the singular is,

though, not equated with a numerical production of individuals118,
which relapses into totality. The reason for the separation of the same
is, thus, related to the specific characteristics of the multiplicity of
singulars. As Levinas points out, ‘the I, which we have seen arise
in enjoyment as a separated being having apart, in itself, the centre
around which its existence gravitates, is confirmed in its singularity
by purging itself of this gravitation’119.
Separation and welcoming: multiple singularities

So, in this ‘relation without relation’ between singulars, one
singularity is open to the other: independence has a dimension of
passive receiving, or welcoming. To maintain separateness, Levinas
emphasises once more that, in the encounter of the other by the
same, ‘their singularity consists in each referring to itself ’120. At the
same time, in a paradoxical turn, the other dominates the same
and appears as a stranger, an orphan, or a widow, to whom the
same is obligated to respond. But the response does not endan-
ger the distance that separates the singular same from the other.
There is, therefore, a positive impossibility to conjoin the I and the
other into a whole, or a totality121. Moreover, there is no limitation
to these singularities since they do not integrate into commerce,
where they could define one another, in correlation. However,
despite the distance, the same and the other are in a relation: the
I, ‘the singular being par excellence’122, is exposed to and elected by
the other. The same is apologetic, or open to excuses for violence
118 TI, p. 220.
119 TI, p. 244.
120 TI, p. 214.
121 TI, p. 221.
122 TI, p. 246.
that he is able to commit, since it is only the other that can be

murdered123. That is the reason why Levinas asserts that uttering
‘I’ means affirming ‘the irreducible singularity in which the apol-
ogy is pursued’124. Within this apologetic relation, ‘the interlocutors
are singularities’125, i.e. separated beings that are not able to being
replaced since they are ‘unique in their genus, faces’. But the face
of the same is only suggested and then rejected as imposing a vi-
cious symmetry in a relation that obligates only the same. That is
to say, recognising a multiplicity of faces would suggest a numerical
contamination of the singular. However, the relation between the
same and the other is a face to face relation, in which, paradoxically,
the face of the same does not have a similar status to the one of the
other. When equivalence is realised, the third party, or the neuter,
comes into play and establishes totality once again. Accordingly, the
separation should be conceived as ‘resistant to synthesis’126, to nega-
tive multiplication of individuals. Levinas prefers the term ‘anarchy’
to qualify this multiplicity of singularities, which cannot generate
a principle, or communal belonging, nor a sense of order, or co-
herence. This is ‘an untotalised multiplicity’, the death of the pan-
oramic that could encompass the singulars under one gaze127. The
multiplicity of the singulars is, hence, the lack of a relation since
‘the relation that binds this multiplicity does not fill the abyss of
separation; it confirms it’128. One can better name it an ‘unrelating
relation’129, i.e. a relation constituting the unicity of the other and
of the same within a pluralist hospitality that refuses synthesis.
123 TI, p. 233.
124 TI, p. 245.
125 TI, p. 252.
126 TI, p. 293.
127 TI, p. 294.
128 TI, p. 295.
129 TI, p. 295.
4. The trace of the pre-original

In our previous observations, we noted that Levinas’s phenom-
enological work finds, in the image of the other, the impulse for a
more reductive type of approach. After turning to being, and then
to existents, Levinas discovers that it is only the other that can
generate a veritable separation, which no synthesis can encompass.
Furthermore, the other is not only singular, but also has a singu-
larising effect on the ego. In his strive to redefine phenomenology,
Levinas detects a non-descriptive givenness, which permits the rev-
elation of multiple singularities. But Levinas takes his phenom-
enological exploration even further: the separation of the other has
to cross the line of familiarity with the constituted singularity of
the ego. After exposing another modality of givenness, Levinas has
to restore an otherwise than synchronic temporality, an otherwise
than thematic language, and an otherwise than being…
The origin and the pre-original

In an attempt to circumscribe the relation established between
singulars, the previous analyses were dominated by the inquiry into
the origin and the original. In this context, if the approach was
still, to a certain extent, descriptive, the investigation crossed the
operative shadow of a descriptive phenomenology in order to de-
ploy the locus of singularity. In his later work, Levinas brings the
examination of singulars to a higher level. That is to say, instead of
addressing singularity at the point of its formation, Levinas goes
beyond the fascination with the origin and the original, so that
a pre-original130 singularity can be signalled. The reason for this
130 Pointing to ‘the non-phenomenality of the phenomenal’ (p. 88), F. Cia-
ramelli (‘The riddle of the pre-original’, in Ethics as First Philosophy, A.
Peperzak ed., New York, Routledge, 1995, pp. 87-95) debates the status of
turn is rooted in the realisation that the origin is still captured by

that which it originates, whereas the pre-original can be related
to the manifesting only as betrayal. Accordingly, the ego becomes
a unicity that cannot have a site, or identity, whose locus is pre-
cisely the impossibility of forming a hypostasis. At the same time,
the other can be approached only through the an-archical saying,
a pre-original language that cannot be subordinated to the said.
The problematic remains that of attempting to insinuate within
a philosophical discourse the plot of singularities, relating to each
other through a relation without relation. Thus, subjectivity, even
without a locus, is the singular defined as the-other-in-the-same.
Against the rigidity of a hypostasis, which can recover itself as iden-
tity and repetitive attribution, the subject becomes, in Otherwise
than Being, the ‘one without identity, but unique in the unexcep-
tionable requisition of responsibility’131. Accordingly, subjectivity
is unrest, impossibility to coincide with oneself, i.e. ‘unicity that
has no site’132. The description of this destitution is captured in
the disqualifying of every internal synthesis that would impose a
substantial sense of inwardness. In a paradoxical way, the identity
of the ego is exactly this incapacity to form identity, or to identify
with itself. Levinas designates this de-situating subjectivity as a be-
ing ‘despite itself ’133, a ‘one-for-the-other’ in which self-coinciding
is unrecoverable. Yet, the significance of enjoyment continues to
be considerable insofar as ‘enjoyment and the singularisation of
sensibility in an ego’ represent ‘the condition of the for-the-other
involved in sensibility’134. In other words, only egoism in the form
the pre-original in Levinas’s work and its relation to the political sphere.
Not a phenomenon in itself, the pre-original can be better defined as both
the condition and the limit of phenomena.
131 OBBE, p. 53.
132 OBBE, p. 8.
133 OBBE, p. 51.
134 OBBE, p. 74.
of possessing the possibility of offering can be the basis for respon-

sibility and for exposure to the other. In this respect, Levinas seems
to suggest that the subject, in the-one-for-the-other, is an incarnate
ego. Indeed, ‘only a subject that eats can be for-the-other’, since
giving to the other, without any initiative, has signification ‘only
among beings of flesh and blood’135.
But the sensibility that is involved in enjoyment is different
from hypostasis as delineated in Levinas’s early work. Still singular,
or even better, a condition of possibility for singularising an ego,
sensibility is here ‘non-present’, a ‘non-commencement’, or a ‘pre-
original not resting on oneself ’136. The same does not delimit itself
as interiority because, despite its incarnated nature, subjectivity re-
fuses exhibition, appearing, but also dissimulation and withdrawal.
That is to say, subjectivity cannot be posited negatively as interiori-
sation, but de-situates itself in a region where it is out of phase with
itself. The subject has abandoned its site of rest, not through a
voluntary act, but in a pre-original offering of itself to the other. In
this sense, Levinas inscribes the double necessity of abandonment
as passivity and, also, as radical destitution of identity, or potential
return. The ego cannot confirm itself through temporal syntheses
because subjectivity is a ‘null site’ without history. The singularity
of the ego is pre-originated in a deposing that can be adequately
described only as ‘pre-birth’, or ‘pre-nature’137.
Anarchic subjectivity
Against Husserl’s model of identification through divergence,
the subject is not caught in the temporal extension of retention
and protention through which the ego can return to itself as ori-
135 OBBE, p. 74.
136 OBBE, p. 75.
137 OBBE, p. 75.
gin of its history, recovering its past as confirmation of its posses-

sions. Levinas is against any ‘synthesising activity of identification
and assemblage’138, with which phenomenology as discourse oper-
ates. Subjectivity is an anarchic affection by the other, an inequality
with oneself within oneself in a way in which the singularity of the
subject is ‘presynthetic, prelogical and in a certain sense atomic’139.
But the atomic ego is not one of a kind, an individual equal to other
individuals, subordinated to a higher commonality; an atomic sub-
jectivity is the one that is ‘in-dividual’, i.e. without fissure or division
within itself. However, the unity of an ego is, paradoxically, the other
in the same, being hostage of the other without being alienated by
this openness. Reverting to the aporetic descriptions of his earlier
texts, Levinas asserts that ‘the infinite passion of responsibility, in its
return upon itself goes further than its identity’140. But identity is not
conceived as a prior stage in the formation of an ego that is constant-
ly surpassed in the course of an inward growing of oneself. Indeed,
identity cannot be achieved except by means of a non-coinciding,
of a delay with regard to its own deposing. The ego is, thus, ‘on the
hither side of the limits of identity’141, i.e. falling apart with itself
while being a unity that does not unify parts into totalities.
The self is not a system, but is rather ‘out of phase with it-
self, forgetful of itself ’142 without being aware of its forgetfulness.
Deploying sensibility as the pre-condition of delivering itself to
the other, Levinas prefers to use the image of a ‘latent birth’ of
the subject. What latency points to is the dormant identity of the
ego as constant incongruity with itself. Thus, subjectivity is ‘an
138 OBBE, p. 104.
139 OBBE, p. 107.
140 OBBE, p. 113.
141 OBBE, p. 114.
142 OBBE, p. 115.
anachronous birth, prior to its own present, a non-beginning, an

anarchy’143. The problem of signifying a pre-original is in fact at the
centre of this discussion since the subject defined as anarchy is the
one that offers signification to the other as an impossibility to enter
the present and to signify in recollection. Therefore, Levinas endea-
vours to induce a sense of ambiguity within discourse, aware of the
constant mutilation of the description which returns to a beyond
its own abilities. Going further than the phenomenal givenness,
which is already denounced as phenomenology, ‘for the appearing
of a phenomenon is already a discourse’144, Levinas finds himself
continuously drawn back to the language of the given, to the said
that can only be a betrayal. Giving the singular as impossibility
of appearing, not in the sense of a negative qualification that still
bears resemblance to its positive counter-attribute, the pre-original
returns to the dignity of an unrecoverable one. Once again, the def-
inition of the singular rejects individuation in terms of particularity
within commonality. As Levinas outlines, ‘the singularity of the
subject (…) is not due to some distinctive quality, like fingerprints,
that would make of it an incomparable unicum, and, as a principle
of individuation, make this unity deserve a proper noun, and hence
a place in discourse’145. It is precisely the dispossession of a site, the
equivocation of every discourse in relation to this pre-original that
defines singularity. In line with the previous observations, Levinas
asserts that ‘the identity of the oneself is not the inertia of a quid-
dity individuated by an ultimate specific difference inherent in the
body or in character, or by the uniqueness of a natural or histori-
cal conjuncture. It is the uniqueness of someone summoned’146.
143 OBBE, p. 139.
144 OBBE, p. 104.
145 OBBE, p. 194 (endnote 9).
146 OBBE, p. 194 (endnote 9).
Consequently, the singular is not to be grounded in the empiri-

cal situation of an existent, nor in the realm of a community of
monads, delimited by their self-recurrence in habitual qualities.
Diachrony and the trace

Singularity is not even an event, since its proximity does not pre-
suppose the continuity in which rupture is commonly integrated. In
this sense, singularity is trace of a trace, the trace that wipes out its
traces. Stated differently, the origin is pre-original, already a trace of
its happening at the point where the beginning has already begun.
The methodological problem embodied in this attempt to say the pre-
original saying is constantly brought to attention by Levinas. Thus,
asserting that the singularity of the responsible I is not to be envis-
aged in conformity with particularity as subordinated to universality,
Levinas warns us against the inappropriateness of conceptualising the
unicity of the ego. Accordingly, he notes that ‘nothing is unique, that
is, refractory to concepts, except the I involved in responsibility’147.
However, the discourse that is mounted about subjectivity is already
a betrayal of the undeclinability of the ego: it universalises ‘the ab-
solute singularity of the responsible one’148. The concept formed on
the uniqueness of an I ‘envelops its singularity149 and absorbs it into
147 OBBE, p. 139.
148 OBBE, p. 129.
149 We consider that F. Ciaremelli’s essay ‘Levinas’s ethical discourse between
individuation and universality’ (in Re-reading Levinas, R. Bernasconi & S.
Critchley eds., London, Athlone Press, 1991, pp. 83-105), on the necessary
compatibility between individuality and the universality of ethics, where the
idea of a universalised singularity is presented, does not capture the most
original philosophical impulses in Levinas’s work. Cf., for a discussion of the
Jewish-messianic motifs in Levinas’s work on singularity and its connection
to idea of Israel’s election, C. Chalier, ‘Singularité juive et philosophie’ (C.
Chalier & M. Abensour eds., Emmanuel Levinas, Paris, L’Herne, 1991).
the universal and into death’150. As a result, Levinas solicits a dia-

chronic movement, where the exceptional otherwise than being
can be at the same time said and unsaid. The model for this dia-
chronic thought is offered by scepticism, which affirms its distrust
in relation to every affirmation, in the form taken by the bracketed
truths. As Levinas remarks, ‘a secret diachrony commands this am-
biguous or enigmatic way of speaking’151. The resemblance to the
phenomenological epoché is yet marginal. Indeed, Levinas seems
to invoke the necessity of a continuous unsaying of the said, where-
as for Husserl the reduction is a moment of indecision, of absten-
tion from any decision, while acknowledging the presence of the
beliefs of the natural attitude inside the brackets. But the reduction
is not mistrust in the form of ambivalence, as Levinas describes
diachrony, for it does not imply a rejection in the form of nega-
tion. On the contrary, diachronic thought is based on the ‘third
condition or the unconditionality of an excluded middle’152. That
is to say, the play between opposite terms provokes violence to the
alternatives so that ‘a diachrony without synthesis’153, even in the
form of negation, can be signified. What is implied in this return of
the discourse to its own affirming capability is a permanent dissat-
isfaction with verbality, expressed through logos itself. As Levinas
notices when articulating the need for philosophical verbality as
opposed to silence, ‘if the philosophical discourse is broken, with-
draws from speech and murmurs, is spoken, it nonetheless speaks
of that, and speaks of the discourse which a moment ago it was
speaking and to which it returns to say its provisional retreat’154.
But diachrony points, by means of discourse, to an otherwise than
150 OBBE, p. 176.
151 OBBE, p. 7.
152 OBBE, p. 183.
153 OBBE, p. 183.
154 OBBE, p. 169.
said and, from this perspective, the reduction operated by Levinas

is not of the order of stating and aborting the statement that states
it. It is true that Husserl’s delimitation of the reduction is less fixed
on the space between speech and its play on the hither side of ver-
bality. It is the natural attitude, rather than the thesis of the natural
attitude that Husserl endeavours to suspend. Nevertheless, Levinas
himself signifies through discourse a pre-original saying that is not
verbal, which cannot enter into commerce with any said except as
betrayal.
‘Saying’ the phenomenological reduction

The importance of the reduction remains, thus, central in
Levinas’s texts despite his constant effort to suggest an otherwise
than phenomenality. It is, hence, not surprising to read at the end
of Otherwise than Being that ‘our analyses claim to be in the spirit
of Husserlian philosophy’155. The role of philosophy is to effect
a reduction of the said to the saying, a reduction of the betray-
al that every discourse produces with regard to the non-original.
Nonetheless, the reduction begins within the said: ‘one has to go
back to that hither side, starting from the trace retained by the
said, in which every thing shows itself. The movement back to the
saying is the phenomenological reduction. In it the indescribable
is described’156. In its limited scope, the reductive move is still con-
demned to fail; that is perhaps the fate of phenomenology as an
infinite task. Indeed, the regressive movement cannot go back to
that which no history is capable of integrating: the pre-original
diachrony of the saying157. It is here that the difference with regard
155 OBBE, p. 183.
156 OBBE, p. 53.
157 OBBE, p. 10.
to reductive phenomenology appears, insofar as the turn to the

pre-original radicalises, or even better, goes beyond the concern
for the origin that a phenomenological project can still legitimise.
The face of the other comes from a past before every beginning,
from an ‘outside, beyond or above, the time recuperable by remi-
niscence’158. In this sense, the face is ‘the very collapse of phenom-
enality’159, the distrust of appearing, or of the image that embod-
ies the pre-original. Moreover, one can call this pre-original saying
excessive because it cannot ever be assembled in a manifestation.
However, the face requires the barbarism of the discourse, of the
said that says the appearing. Indeed, the pre-original, marked by
its non-temporal antecedence, signifies only through a broken ap-
pearing. Thus, the face is precisely ‘the ambiguity of a phenomenon
and its defect’160. The pre-original saying demands this ‘ambiguous
defecting of appearing’161, attends to its manifestation in order to
unsay it. But diachrony does not comply to manifestation in order
to present itself as another synthetic unity in the form of bringing
together the said and the unsaid, for the diachronic pre-original is
singular, does not have measure, and cannot be assembled.
Assemblage and language

The image of assemblage is of great importance in Otherwise
than Being as it continues the line of refusal of totality. Yet, its
evocation is even stronger because it refutes not only the idea of
uniting under the common measure of a principle, or of forming
analogies, but also the possibility of reference between terms. The
158 OBBE, p. 85.
159 OBBE, p. 88.
160 OBBE, p. 90.
161 OBBE, p. 90.
common locus of assemblage is the linguistic model with which the

said operates. Indeed, ‘in the said, to have meaning is for an ele-
ment to be in such a way as to turn into reference to other elements,
and for the others to be evoked by it’162. Husserl’s phenomenology
itself seems to abide by this linguistic pattern, which subordinates
meaning to a higher system of correlation, through which every
term functions. Against this model, the saying signifies ‘a relation-
ship between uneven terms, without any common time’163.
The impossibility of synchrony, or commonality between terms,
is the said of the pre-original saying. Phenomenology is, therefore,
molded on linguistic relations. In this line, entities are defined
through constant reference to one another, ‘like words in a linguistic
system’164. Additionally, entities do not retain ‘any supplementary
identity other than that which is due to the reference of each term
to all the other terms’165. But singularity is precisely that which
rejects the adequacy of such a model, because the singular signifies
as ambiguity when translated into the language of the appearing.
While criticising the pre-eminence of language as structure sus-
taining the manifestation of phenomena in Husserl’s philosophy,
Levinas imposes the consideration of a defective language, or of a
discourse that says the saying and reduces itself at the same time.
An otherwise than temporality

Phenomenology, as monstration, functions by bringing to light
identifications within every difference. The most important exam-
ple in this respect is offered by the analyses on time-consciousness,
162 OBBE, p. 69.
163 OBBE, p. 70.
164 OBBE, p. 95.
165 OBBE, p. 96.
where differing is always circumscribed within identity, as primal

impression returns to itself in retention, or expects itself in pro-
tention166. For Husserl, every past can be recuperated in memory,
which endures in the supremacy of the present, the origin or the
beginning. The temporal flow is the metaphor of repetition since
‘to speak of time in terms of flowing is to speak of time in terms of
time and not in terms of temporal events’167. That is to say, time as
synthetical flowing is still a form of assembling the disparate, the
singular that cannot be caught in similarities, or retrieve itself in
a regressive move. But, as we have already noticed, the notion of
event is itself misleading because it coheres with the idea of a more
encompassing order. Indeed, one can say that ‘every event presup-
poses time’168, and, thus, singularity has to signify even beyond the
event, not a temporal otherwise, but an otherwise than temporal-
ity. The mode of signifying the saying is, therefore, by turning to a
past more ancient than any present,
a past which was never present and whose anarchical antiquity
was never given in the play of dissimulations and manifestations,
a past whose other signification remains to be described, signifies
over and beyond the manifestation of being169.
The anarchy of the singular is embodied in the failure of any type
of equivalence. Indeed, singularity, which is both the same and the
other in the relation of the-other-in-the-same, does not have com-
mon measure, even with itself. Significantly, Levinas suggests that the
singular is non-temporal, or diachronically temporal, and can only
signify and establish equivalence in terms of meaning, by stating the
166 OBBE, p. 32.
167 OBBE, p. 34.
168 OBBE, p. 34.
169 OBBE, p. 24.
signifying as significance of the pre-original. The idea of a past that

has never been present, opposed to Husserl’s understanding of tem-
porality, can also be found in Bergson’s definition of the past as ‘the
in-itself of time’, and ‘a pure, general, a priori element of all time’170.
Indeed, the past cannot be produced through a regressive move start-
ing from the present (‘memory does not consist in a regression from
the present to the past’); it is rather the past that determines the flow-
ing of the present171. In this sense, the past is a pure immemorial that
forms the ground of time. As Deleuze points out, the past affects us
‘within forgetting, as though immemorial’172.
A barbarous ‘logos’
As we have discovered previously, phenomenology is, for Levinas,
interpretation, a “this-as-that” in the sense of equating reality and
logos, or reality as logos. Thus, ‘the word signifies “this-as-that”,
170 Deleuze’s commentary in DR, p. 82. Cf. G. Deleuze, Bergsonism, New
York, Zone Books, 2002.
171 H. Bergson, Matter and Memory, New York, Zone Books, 2002, p. 239.
172 Deleuze, DR, p. 85. It is interesting to note that Deleuze distinguishes
between ‘habit’ (empirical passive synthesis), and ‘memory’ (transcendental
passive synthesis, or pure past). Nonetheless, Deleuze introduces a third
type of repetition, or a third synthesis of time, which is no longer present
(habit), nor immemorial (pure past). This is the repetition of the future as
an eternal return, that is, the ‘time by excess’ of the ‘man without name’
(p. 90). Deleuze emphasises the idea that the immemorial is a ground that
grounds by ‘bending’ itself on what it grounds. In Levinas’s terms, the
immemorial exists only as affecting diachronically the present, i.e. the eco-
nomic self. In this context, the third synthesis, which Deleuze unveils,
operates a leap outside the economy of the present and the immemorial, in
order to effect the time of ethics. ‘In this final synthesis of time, the present
and the future are in turn no more than dimensions of the future’ (p.93).
For Levinas, this is precisely the time of ethics, of the substitution for the
other, and of the one without qualities.
states the identity of the same in the diverse’173. Meaning shows the
phenomenon in an identification move which is derived and differ-
ent from the lived: ‘the “this-as that” is not lived; it is said’174. But
Levinas’s view of phenomenology remains deliberately ambiguous
and paradoxical, invalidating the project by situating itself within
the necessity to radicalise it, to explode the discourse from within,
so that the pre-original shows itself at work in the logos that says it.
Thus, to a certain extent, philosophy cannot be anything else but
phenomenology, or discourse about the pre-original signifying. As
Levinas notes, ‘philosophy, which is born with appearing, with the-
matisation, tries in the course of its phenomenology, to reduce the
manifest and the manifestation to their pre-original signification’175.
Nonetheless, phenomenology is only a subsequent realisation be-
cause ‘a phenomenon is possible without a kerygmatic logos, without
a phenomenology’176. Indeed, faithful to the fundamental vocation
of a phenomenological project, Levinas endeavours to bring to light
a signification that is prior to the signifying activity of a constitut-
ing ego, a pre-original affection that signifies passively before any
discursive grasp. In light of this mission, language has to become
barbarous. Indeed, ‘how can such a research be undertaken with-
out introducing some barbarisms in the language of philosophy?’177.
In fact, phenomenology is necessary for the unveiling of the saying
that every logos betrays. If it is true that phenomenology is rooted in
conjunction, simultaneity, or co-presence178, the violence provoked
by the reduction of the equivalence to the pre-original saying is
precisely the manifestation of this diachronic anarchy. Moreover, if
173 OBBE, p. 35.
174 OBBE, p. 35.
175 OBBE, p. 65.
176 OBBE, p. 133.
177 OBBE, p. 178.
178 OBBE, p. 133.
for phenomenology ‘any radical non assembling diachrony would

be excluded from meaning’179, this exclusion constitutes the very
meaning of the saying. Consequently, the singular signifies from
within phenomenology; it requires the service of a said, but only
in order to reveal its anarchic ambiguity. Through the said, ‘the
phenomenon itself is a phenomenology’180. But is this not the very
condition of a saying and its manifestation as being on the hither
side of meaning?
The said of the pre-original

The reduction that is brought forth by phenomenology is,
hence, a positive moment within the diachrony of the immemo-
rial. The plot of the saying, which is without a beginning because
it cannot be encompassed by a totalising consciousness, signifies
on the hither side of the said. But how can one speculate on the
pre-original saying, if the only legitimising project is limited to the
abusive said? It is this enigmatic impossibility that the dissatisfac-
tion with the appearing initiates. As a result, one can say that the
singular givenness of singularity is an ambiguity, ‘both an affirma-
tion and a retraction of the said’181. The echo of an otherwise is its
own profanation182. Furthermore, the saying demands, paradoxi-
cally, its falsification, or its betrayal: ‘the plot proper to saying does
indeed lead it to the said, to the putting together of structures’183.
To describe this exigency, Levinas prefers to use the image of an
inversion of intentionality: instead of focusing on the constitutive
179 OBBE, p. 135.
180 OBBE, p. 37.
181 OBBE, p. 44.
182 OBBE, p. 44.
183 OBBE, p. 46.
pole of the intentional relation, he stresses the violent nature of an

immemorial affection.
But is this affection not a passivity of the subject, of the one af-
fected? That is, in reality, the compromise that the pre-original has
to accept: its uniqueness depends on the logos that says it, on the
consciousness that assembles and identifies entities, on the subject
that synchronises and renders affections contemporaneous with
each other. The similarity with Derrida’s gift which is not to be
recognised as a gift is significant. The inscription into recognition
is the absence of the gift, its own impossibility. But can we say that
the pre-original is also a pre-given? Is the singular that Levinas tries
to evoke a pre-given uniqueness? Certainly, the impossible given-
ness of a pre-given seems to capture the same tension that appears
in the saying of the saying. But the role of originator is mutated
in Levinas’s later texts: the saying is the destruction of a memo-
rable time, and responsibility is ‘in a time without beginning’184.
However, what difference does it make to the discourse of the ap-
pearing if the singular is origin, one that we cannot manifest, or
pre-original anarchy? More profoundly, one can affirm that the pre-
original is even more foreign to the manifested than the origin, that
it needs its confusion with the origin in order to be contaminated
and show itself. The idea of a creatio ex nihilo captures precisely the
paradoxical ambiguity of the pre-original. Thus, ‘in the concept
of a creation ex nihilo, if it is not a pure non-sense, there is the
concept of a passivity that does not revert into an assumption’185.
What Levinas tries to circumscribe here is a certain ignorance of
itself that defines the pre-original. This is the situation of a creature
that does not know itself as created, but as ‘an orphan by birth
or an atheist no doubt ignorant of its Creator, for if it knew it,
184 OBBE, p. 51.
185 OBBE, p. 113.
it would again be taking up its commencement’186. Accordingly,

the pre-original singularity has to indicate through the said, as a
trace of a trace, borrowing the non-appearing of the origin. The
saying is, thus, an echo, an election without prior commitment, a
past that has not been present, and cannot even be remembered.
Thus, the origin is the very trace of an immemorial past, the one
that the said remembers because it affects it. The origin is the very
trace of the pre-original, ‘the trace of a passage’187, ‘a trace lost in
a trace, less than nothing in the trace of an excessive’ enigma, the
mere ‘ambiguity of being a trace’188. Likewise, the pre-original is
‘trace expelled in a trace’, silence for which the origin is not radi-
cal enough because it is still original and originator, a condition
of possibility, the one that hides behind the scenes. The anarchy,
nonetheless, has to become ambiguity, ambivalence, both affirma-
tion and negation, paradox and enigma. However, Levinas realises
that the pre-original can only be honoured in silence, or take the
exposure of an origin and admit itself as responsibility, as ethical
discourse, suggesting absence. It is as if the singular that we know
about could only be but a ‘complete surprise’189, the unknown rec-
ognised as such.
The ambiguity of Levinas’s saying

Levinas’s description is exasperating, provoking frustration
within an attempt to determine the constant equivocation of the
singular. The saying is supposed to be a trauma, a persecution and
‘a denuding beyond the skin, to the wounds that one dies from, de-
186 OBBE, p. 105.
187 OBBE, p. 91.
188 OBBE, p. 93.
189 OBBE, p. 99.
nuding to death’190. The said that turns to the said that says it, the
meta-discourse that leaves one without grounds, in a ‘non-site’, is
the adventure of the same that loses itself in the plot of the saying.
Consequently, one cannot return with certitudes from interpreting
the ambiguity of the pre-original which signifies as an excluded
middle. But, if one has to point to the project of a phenomenologi-
cal givenness of singularity191, then the frustration of this attempt
at concluding the unsaying of the said has to bring to light what-
constitutes the very signification of diachrony. Aware of the fact
that ‘for signification, the-one-for-the-other, is never an enough’192,
one has to concede that the election by the singular is ambiguity,
and ambivalence. The pre-original, ‘older than every beginning’193,
strikes through the ambiguity of the said. To a certain extent, the
givenness requires suspension, indecision, and hesitation: ‘we have
named enigma the hesitation between knowing and responsibili-
ty’194. But this irresolution does not imply a moment of discern-
ment for responsibility cannot ever be assumed. The role of philos-
ophy is, then, to become aware of the betrayal imposed by the said,
by constantly reducing decision and certainty. As Levinas affirms,
‘philosophy is called upon to conceive ambivalence, to conceive it in
several times’195. What does diachrony mean in terms of temporal
givenness? The said operates with simultaneity and co-presence: the
190 OBBE, p. 49.
191 One can employ J. Rolland’s description of Levinas’s philosophy to capture
this constant movement towards ambiguity: ‘contre-phénoménologie com-
me phénoménologie du non-phénoménal’ (‘Divine comédie: la question de
Dieu chez Lévinas’, La différence comme non-indifférence, A. Münster ed.,
Paris, Kimé, 1995, pp. 109-129), p. 110.
192 OBBE, p. 138.
193 OBBE, p. 145.
194 OBBE, p. 155.
195 OBBE, p. 162.
appearing is captured by the present that imposes communality

between moments. At the same time, the saying is the past that
cannot be remembered, the non-present or excessive immemorial.
Diachrony is, then, the impossibility of putting together the say-
ing and the said, and the distance created between the two as a
separation which refuses any type of conjunction. But diachrony
is not only the defeat of a synoptic grasp; it is itself singularity,
the relation between singulars as the-other-in-the-same, through
which the other, signifying the beyond memory and assemblage,
singularises subjectivity and its relation to it. Proximity, which is
exactly this diachronic and anarchic ‘relationship with a singularity
without the mediation of any principle, any ideality’196, is, para-
doxically, the very distance between the immemorial and the pres-
ent. Moreover, this distance increases with the perfection of prox-
imity. Employing again a consistent defeat of the logos, Levinas
writes that ‘in contact itself the touching and the touched separate,
as though the touched moved off, was already other, did not have
anything common with me. As though its singularity, thus non-
anticipatable and consequently not representable, responded only
to designation197. Or, ‘the distance is enlarged in the measure that
proximity narrows’198.
Substituting singulars: ethics and election

The description of the-other-in-the-same is in accordance with
the multiplicity of singularities that Levinas outlined in Totality and
Infinity; indeed, subjectivity is the singular election by the unique
other, in a movement of diachronic separation which is already sin-
196 OBBE, p. 100.
197 OBBE, p. 86.
198 OBBE, p. 145.
gularised. Without any possibility of comparison, or coinciding, the

singularity of the subjective same is defined by its capacity to sub-
stitute itself for the other199. This is the ultimate point of confusion,
for how can a singular substitute itself for another singular, which
refuses any common grounds? The answer is given in ethical terms:
the subject is elected, chosen, accused and persecuted by the other.
The limits of a phenomenological givenness are here acute: no one
can provoke a givenness that has no beginning. The descriptive that
turns into prescriptive200 becomes suspicious, alien to the discursive,
exotic. If ‘phenomenology can follow out the reverting of themati-
sation into anarchy in the description of the approach’, it is only
the ‘ethical language [that] succeeds in expressing the paradox in
which phenomenology finds itself abruptly thrown’201. Expressions
199 One can find a similar idea in Husserl’s considerations on the idea of a tran-
scendental ethics. Thus, Husserl says, ‘I must be able to affirm the acts of
others as well as my own acts’ (D. Cairns, op. cit., p. 35). Moreover, Husserl
quotes Dostoievsky’s observation that ‘each is guilty for the guilt of all’. Yet,
despite this apparent semblance, Husserl’s motivation for substitution is not
asymmetry as it is in Levinas’s work, but the harmony of monads. Indeed,
the constitutional activities of transcendental egos are teleological, oriented
towards the achievement of harmony. In this perspective, ‘the unethical is
that which is contrary to this telos’, while ethics is nothing else but the pos-
sibility of substitution as deriving from the consistency of all monads.
200 Cf. Lyotard’s arguments (‘Logique de Lévinas’, in Textes pour Emmanuel
Lévinas, F. Laruelle ed., Paris: J. Michel, 1980, pp. 127-151) in favour of
ethics as obligation and prescription, which presupposes asymmetry, and
the problems that the transformation of prescription into description give
rise to. Speaking of Levinas’s ethics, Lyotard remarks that what is at stake
here is the ability to articulate obligation without transforming it into a
norm. That is, the prescriptive has to be kept apart from descriptive clauses
that describe it. Thus, the commentary on a received order is already the
betrayal of this prescription. But, despite his insightful defence, Lyotard
seems to point to the impossible said of the prescriptive, rather than solve
the paradoxical relation between the said and the saying.
201 OBBE, p. 121.
such as ‘martyrdom’ and ‘obsession’, or the other defined as ‘perse-

cutor’, give rise to imperatives that are no longer phenomenological.
Indeed, manifestation as ambivalence, or ambiguity, is still situated
in relation to givenness, as excessive or abusive signifying. However,
with Levinas, one has the impression that the singular has already
been decided before one attempts to delimit it in terms of givenness.
It is as if a commitment has already been made which is foreign and
singular, alien to the constitutive experience of a subject because it
cannot be provoked, or summoned. And it is precisely this prior
commitment that we have to determine as non-phenomenological,
prescriptive, speculative and suppositional. Phenomenology can
rightly be described as the one that
weaves between the incomparable, between me and the others, a
unity, a community (if only the unity of analogy), and drags us
off and assembles us on the same side, chaining us to one another
like gallery slaves, emptying proximity of its meaning. Every at-
tempt to disjoin the conjunction and the conjuncture would be
only clashing of the chains.202
But if singularity cannot be given as equivalence and synthesis,
is its enigma more than this superlative and hyperbolic significa-
tion that Levinas emphasises in his later writings? Is the decision to
an otherwise than given necessarily more than a given otherwise?
How far does our commitment to phenomenology accompany the
discourse on singularity? Let us now guide our attention to Michel
Henry’s phenomenology of life - another account of singularity that
struggles with the same paradoxical relation with phenomenology, in
order to put into perspective the obsession that Levinas introduces
in his description of the excessive and displaced singularity. Can a
pre-original be anything else than an original? Why do we approach
202 OBBE, p. 182.
the pre-original if it is immemorial and non-present? What kind of

distortion is there in this mutation from the origin to an anarchic
singularity? In a paradoxical way, declaring himself ‘faithful to in-
tentional analysis’, Levinas ‘ventures beyond phenomenology’203.
What interests us here is exactly this movement beyond phenom-
enology and its relation to singularity. Is ‘otherwise than given’ still
barbarous? Moreover, how are we to understand the persecution
that accompanies this barbarity? To quote Levinas again, ‘one is
tempted to call this plot religious’204. Shall we then accept that
singularity brings forth an obligatory and inescapable ‘theological
turn’, as Janicaud proclaims205? Let us leave these questions open
so that another confrontation with phenomenology in the name of
singularity may be displayed. The traumatic and obsessive other,
singularity singularising without identifying itself as originator or
appearing, is to be replaced by the auto-affection of life which does
not estrange itself in manifestation. The singular defies again equal-
ity, equivalence, and comparison in order to deploy its singularity.
203 OBBE, p. 183.

204 OBBE, p. 147.
205 D. Janicaud, Le tournant théologique de la phénoménologie française (Paris,
Éd. de l’Éclat, 1991).
CHAPTER VI
MICHEL HENRY
ON THE SINGULAR IPSEITY OF LIFE
As stated above, in this chapter we will look at another attempt

to offer a phenomenological explanation of singularity, which is
here defined as ‘invisible immanence’, ‘pathos’, ‘self-affection’, or
‘life’. In the first section, we will investigate Michel Henry’s reac-
tion to classical phenomenology, focusing on the project of a more
radical reduction. In particular, we will present Henry’s reading of
Husserl’s account on singularity, in order to unveil the original-
ity of an absolute immanence. We will then turn to the definition
of singularity to discern the criteria that a phenomenology of the
singular has to respect. Based on these conditions, the second sec-
tion will discuss the way in which life escapes more encompassing
syntheses. In the third part, we will show that the inner structure of
life is also non-synthetic, though it permits a multiplicity of singu-
lars. The conclusive section, drawing on the idea of the gift of life,
proposes an analysis of the singular in terms of a phenomenology
of the giving.
1. Against Husserl: towards absolute singularity

The radical reduction of the visible
One of the best ways of introducing Henry’s phenomenology
of singularity is by stressing the confrontational dimension of its
foundations in relation to previous phenomenological projects. As
we proceeded in the case of Levinas’s phenomenology of the other,
the ‘negative’ accentuation of differences is to unveil the more pro-
found and creative part of Henry’s thinking, that is, his phenomenol-
ogy of life. For Henry, traditional phenomenology originates in a
horizon of visibility, which subordinates the Being of the subject to
the transcendence of its intentional correlate. The origin of this sub-
ordination of the invisible to ec-stasis is to be traced back to Husserl’s
decision to introduce an intentional or noetic element within the
invisible reality of impression. The primal revelation of the invisible
in the non-intentional impression is abruptly rejected: firstly, in its
dependence on the form that in-forms it; secondly, in the ec-static
nature of impression in the temporal flowing1. By means of these two
moves, the impression becomes exposed and taken out of its own site;
it reveals itself as visible. To this extent, it is indispensable to rework
phenomenology in order to unveil a different type of phenomenol-
ogy, which does not manifest itself in correspondence with world-
givenness and does not presuppose distance. In fact, like Levinas,
Henry strives to uproot the intentional aspect of phenomenology
since, in intentional relations, the access to the objective world is
constituted by alienation and distancing from the things. This im-
plies that a more fundamental reduction has to be performed so that
the truth of immanence, ‘a truth higher in origin, more ancient,
and without which transcendence itself would not be’2, as Henry
declares, can be disclosed. This original3 revelation that refers to the
1 Cf. supra, Henry’s critique of Husserl in our first chapter, ‘The primitive
sense-data, or non-compounded singulars’.
2 EM, p. 37.
3 On this point, G. Dufour-Kowalska (Michel Henry. Une philosophie de la
vie et de la praxis, Paris, Vrin, 1980) accurately notes that ‘Michel Henry’s
philosophy is not a philosophy of a radical departing point, but one of the
original’, where original means ‘the absolutely primitive condition, sur-
passing all conditions, [and] resting only in itself. The original designates
the absolute’ (p. 12). On the basis of these remarks, Henry’s fascination
for the Cartesian cogito should not be understood as an adherence to the
modern ontological project of a radical beginning, but rather as a search
THE SINGULAR IPSEITY OF LIFE 243
absolute immanence of the subject, is an invisible and non-inten-

tional self-experiencing. Remaining faithful to this discovery, Henry
requires an alteration of the limiting conception of phenomena as
visibility, and of phenomenology as a philosophy of transcendence4.
More importantly, the regress to the origin of transcendence cannot
be accomplished within visibility because ‘to want “to bring to light”
the foundation is the ultimate ontological absurdity’5. However, the
immanent revelation of subjectivity offers phenomenology a founda-
tion which is not contaminated by distance and transcendence, and
refuses to appear in the light.
Henry’s phenomenology is directed towards revealing the primi-
tive dimension of life by imposing a revision of Husserl’s formative
project, but also a critical approach to traditional philosophy. The
main motif of his phenomenology is not radical exteriority, as in
Levinas’s account of the other, but the distancing from the objec-
tive world, in order to encompass the singularity of an immanent
subjectivity, or an absolute interiority. That is to say, the singularity
that Henry envisages in his work is entirely different from the one
that Levinas has in mind when discussing the radical transcendence
of the other and the paradoxical condition of an a-synchronic given-
for the trace of an immemorial affection. The passage from an ontological
to an ethical phenomenology is significant in this respect. This transforma-
tion within Henry’s philosophical project, similar to that of Levinas, was
considered, in the previous chapter, as a passage from the origin(al) to the
pre-origin(al). Accordingly, Henry radicalises not only the modern search
for an absolute beginning, that is also to be found in Husserl’s work: in his
latter work the Christian motifs provoke a radical revision of the ontologi-
cal themes of his early texts so that an Archi-origin can be revealed.
4 EM, p. 42.
5 EM, p. 42. It is interesting to note that both Henry and Levinas deny
ontology, either from the beginning, as Levinas does, or in the final stages
of their thought, as it is the case with Henry’s phenomenology, the right to
legitimate itself as first philosophy. Cf., for instance, Henry, I, 43.
ness. For Henry, the singular is ‘beyond’ the ec-static nature of the
‘outside’, which makes phenomenology a study of the appearing of
phenomena, and subordinates it to the distance separating the things
themselves from the one who observes them. Indeed, the thinking
of the world has to be bracketed and the revealing of immanence
in its radical immediacy has to replace the traditional concern for
transcendence. Experiencing the immanent self, which cannot take
its features from the appearing of the mundane objects, is equivalent
to revelation and originates in pathos.
Sharing with Levinas an interest in a radical form of phenome-
nology, Henry strives to regress towards an inaugural investigation,
towards phenomenology as first philosophy. In this sense, Henry’s
phenomenology of singularity aims to answer the most fundamen-
tal questions regarding the absolute, as an origin and as an original
modality of givenness. In its specificity, the singular is the impera-
tive that forms the basis for establishing phenomenology as first
philosophy. To employ again Janicaud’s terms, conceived in line
with the giving of singularity, phenomenology is a ‘maximalist’6
project, with an interest in the ultimate as source and pattern of
the relation to the world and to itself. For Husserl, the epoché is
such a moment of maximal tension, as it turns its attention towards
the presupposed grounds of the reduction to the ultimate, to the
6 D. Janicaud, La phénoménologie éclatée (Paris, Eds. de l’Éclat, 1998). Before
Janicaud, M. Haar (‘Michel Henry entre phénoménologie et métaphysique’,
Philosophie, 15, 1987, pp. 30-54) affirms that ‘M. Henry’s thinking departs
from the classical, “logical” ontology, being in fact close to what one can call
a negative onto-theology’ (p.53). This description can equally be applied to
Levinas’s phenomenology insofar as he is guided by the same imperative to
absoluteness and by the possibility of an otherwise than common language.
However, the maximalist motifs in a phenomenology of the singular will be
addressed in more detail in our conclusive remarks. For the moment, one has
to notice the recurrence of these themes without disputing the possibility of
a phenomenology of the absolute.
singular as primal or/and absolute givenness. The epoché puts the

world into brackets and nullifies its assumptions in a way which
makes its evidence illuminate only through its annulment, insofar
as claims to validity are concerned. With Henry one detects the
same movement, formulated in terms which appear to repeat, to
a great extent, the ones that initiated it, but the radical restoration
of the inner ambitions of phenomenology departs quickly from
its initial effort. Describing the reductive moment of the epoché,
Henry notes that ‘the epoché is the epoché of the world, the put-
ting it out of circulation as it were in the radical sense of dealing
with the world as such’7. Referring to epoché as the quest for an
origin, Henry underlines the fact that ‘the epoché poses with regard
to itself ’ ‘the question of its possibility and its origin’8. Quoting
Fink’s idea that the reduction ‘supposes itself ’, Henry remarks that,
‘to the phenomenologist who asks what he is doing, the reduc-
tion, because it in no way allows its origin to appear in thought
as a “motif ”, henceforth appears without foundation’9. That is the
reason why Henry defines his phenomenology as an unveiling of
the invisible, an abolishment of the light that thought attempts to
bring within the revelation of foundational affectivity. In a similar
way, it is also a phenomenology of birth, of the beginning and of
the coming to life of ‘the One that inhabits the Origin’10.
Husserl’s misconception of singularity

We have purposely refrained so far from offering a precise defi-
nition of what Henry understands by singularity, for the confron-
tation with Husserl on this matter is highly illustrative. The radical
7 Henry, EM, p. 391.
8 EM, p. 392.
9 EM, p. 392.
10 Henry, CV, p. 77.
reduction of the visible, in its regression towards a primitive invis-

ibility, can be caught at work through the reaction against Husserl’s
ecstatic understanding of singularity. For this purpose, let us ex-
plore the passage that Henry operates from a representational ‘sin-
gularity’, which is equated with a form of subjective particularity,
to an absolute singularity. The reading of one of Husserl’s texts pro-
pels Henry to disclose the originality of an inner affection which
advances a different connotation of subjectivity11. This means that
subjectivity differs from the relative and particular life-processes
of empirical beings, and constitutes an absolute singularity. But
before we examine, in more specific lines, Henry’s contribution to
a radical interpretation of singularity, let us discuss the revision
introduced by him in Husserl’s work.
The Idea of Phenomenology can be convincingly considered
as one of the most compelling endeavours of phenomenology to
clarify its status as a method for philosophical inquiry, and also
as a discipline in its own right. Husserl introduces, in this text, a
complete definition of immanence and of transcendence, in con-
formity with the ideal of an absolute givenness and with the claim
to a radical scientific basis. It is precisely this distinction that Henry
focuses on in order to impose a new concept of immanence. The
major criticism that forms the essence of Henry’s appropriation of
phenomenology is built on the difference that Husserl establishes
between the cogitatio, and the pure seeing, which is the only one
11 G. Van Riet (‘Une nouvelle ontologie phénoménologique. La philosophie
de Michel Henry’, Revue philosophique de Louvain, 64, 1966, pp. 436-457)
rightly remarks that for Henry the subject is not an ontical being, but rather
an ontological principle. M. Haar, art.cit., also mentions the idea that Henry’s
immanence is not psychological, but ontological. Furthermore, for Henry ‘it
is not a question, firstly and exclusively, of the immanence of the subject, but
rather of the immanence of being itself’ (p.34). The connection with Heide-
gger’s primitive interest in Being rather than in beings is obvious.
capable of conferring absolute evidence to phenomena. The defini-

tion of immanence follows this distinction: immanence is knowl-
edge through pure seeing. Duplicating immanence, in a first in-
stance, serves to subordinate, in a final investigation, the cogitatio
to transcendence. The nature of Gegebenheit is, therefore, disjoined,
so that between the given and the giving a total rupture is consti-
tuted. Giving the given is the only manner in which the cogitatio
can claim evidence. As Henry points out in his commentary, ‘the
cogitatio is [an absolute givenness] not by itself, or in itself, but by
means of an exterior giving that is adjoined to its original being’12.
Disclosing the inherent inconsistencies of Husserl’s account, Henry
opens up the question of singularity of the cogitation. Since phe-
nomenology is to be qualified by Husserl as surpassing the ‘subjec-
tive’ truth of a singular experience in favour of universal evidences,
Henry notices that singularity has the status, in the original text,
of a negative designation. When applied to cogitationes, singular-
ity becomes the exact opposite of immanence. Thus, Henry raises
the question: ‘what signifies this epithet, which is going to be ap-
pended, in a pejorative manner, during the entire remaining part
of these Lectures, to cogitationes in order to disqualify them, and,
eventually, to justify their elimination from the problematic’ [of
the discussion]?13 The answer encompasses the limited evidence of
13 PM, p. 84. Cf. also I, First Part, § 12, ‘The misinterpretation of the Car-
tesian cogito by Husserl. Its consequences: the denigration of the singular
life and its replacement with the ‘‘essence’’ of life in the thematical turn of
the phenomenological method’, pp. 103-111. The original interpretation of
the Cartesian cogito that Henry proposes opposes its appropriation by both
Husserl and Heidegger. Thus, while Husserl’s errors have been underlined
in the previous comments, Henry’s position with regard to Heidegger is
equally critical. Indeed, for Heidegger the cogito is merely reflective and
ecstatic (see e.g., V. Perego, ‘Affettività e immanenza. Michel Henry let-
tore critico di Heidegger’, Rivista di Filosofia neo-scholastica, 93/2, 2001,
a ‘this-here’ and of factuality, which are ephemeral and exposed to

non-being. The real issue behind this disqualification of the singu-
lar is that Husserl’s concept of singularity is clearly confused with
the one of particularity, which defines itself in relation to temporal
insertion into the immanent flow and spatial positioning. Indeed,
Husserl often points to the reality of a ‘singular experience’, ‘singu-
lar intuition’, or ‘singular perception’14. But, for him, the singular
givenness of the cogitatio is a relative immanence, which has to be
discarded in order to bring universals to absolute givenness, and to
accomplish a general research into essences. For Husserl, the cogi-
tationes are ‘immanent in the false sense, namely, [as] existing in
the sphere of individual consciousness’15. As a consequence, Husserl
expresses the necessity to throw off ‘the first and immediate prejudice
that sees the absolutely given only in the singular cogitatio’16.
To be sure, for Henry, Husserl’s examination of the singularity of
the cogitatio is a failure to seize upon the veritable nature of imma-
nence and to breach the contamination of immanent subjectivity by
transcendence. Accordingly, Henry insists that we move slowly from
the inability to consider the cogitationes within the sphere of pure
immanence, to elevating singularity beyond subjective particularity.
Indeed, the prejudice that Husserl denounces with regard to the cog-
itatio is in fact a missed opportunity to perceive the reality of ipseity
pp. 280-305; Y. Morin, ‘‘Il me semble que je vois”: l’énoncé cartésien et la
lecture qu’en fait Michel Henry’, Laval théologique et philosophique, 51/3,
1995, pp. 529-539). Heidegger considers the Cartesian doubt to be marked
by a philosophical prejudice, namely the stress on the pre-eminence of sub-
jectivity. However, Henry admits that Heidegger rightly accords, in his
own texts, an important role to affectivity, as modality of revealing the
sense of being. From this point of view, the affective Dasein is a step for-
ward in relation to Husserl’s phenomenology.
14 Cf. Idea, pp. 38, 50; or pp. 50, 68.
15 Idea, pp. 42, 57.
16 Idea, pp. 46, 62.
and ‘the transcendental singularity that belongs to it’17. The collapse

of phenomenology is, thus, triggered by the rejection of immanence,
even in its aborted form, i.e. as particular subjectivity. Henry is very
explicit on this matter: the concept of singularity loses its veritable
meaning when it begins to designate temporal individuation, ecstatic
inclusion into phenomenological time, and not ‘its radical ipseity
as an idea of the original cogitatio’18. The substitution of the cogi-
tationes to the claim to scientific evidence refutes the subjective na-
ture of factual experience. Following this move, immanence is trans-
formed into its contrary and confused with its dissimulating image.
Against this phenomenological discourse, Henry brings forth a more
original givenness: the one of self-givenness which describes life as
absolute subjectivity. Husserl, though, cannot grasp this immanence
because of his commitment to an alien domain: ‘the one of the gen-
eral, of the transcendent being, for which pure seeing reveals itself to
be the adequate mode of access’19. As Henry points out, the singular
cogitatio cannot find a significant place in Husserl’s account because
phenomenology, in its initial assumptions, operates with distance
and pure seeing. In this situation, the singular, which contains no
cleavage within itself, cannot be brought to pure givenness. In fact,
the cogitatio is the invisible par excellence, the self-giving life that
situates itself at the margins of a transcendent gaze. The substitution
of a transcendent essence to the invisible cogitatio is evidence for the
ignorance of life and existence, which can become phenomenologi-
cal data only by re-presenting themselves, by splitting their imma-
nence from inside out. Superimposing an intentional relation to an
‘outside’ self-affection, Husserl eventually transforms the immanence
of the singular cogitatio into transcendence. No doubt, for Henry,
17 PM, p. 84.
18 PM, p. 85.
19 PM, p. 94.
the phenomenological reduction is the exemplary illustration of this

blindness which obliterates the invisible nature of immanence.
Why is life singular?

After sketching in broad lines the manner in which Henry de-
picts the singularity of the absolute immanence, it is clear that the
singular, as distinguished from the particularity of empirical be-
ings, can also take different expressions. Henry uses different imag-
es to describe singularity: immanence, subjectivity, invisibility and
life- they all grasp different aspects of one and the same original
foundation. But, while the commentary on Husserl’s text showed
that singularity cannot be confused with relative subjectivism, it
has also left open the question of the qualities of a singular. So, let
us focus now on what renders life singular.
First, the singularity of life is sustained by the fact that imma-
nence is without context (‘a sphere of radical immanence exists by
itself without context’20). This exclusion, which does not constitute
a privation, extends as far as temporality is concerned: immanence
‘owes nothing to time’21. With regard to temporal becoming, Henry
states very clearly that ‘the possibility of feeling itself, the ipseity of
essence, does not realise itself in time’22. As we have already no-
ticed in the confrontation with Husserl’s hyletic phenomenology,
for Henry, temporality is an ecstatic structure that cannot be ap-
plied to the constitution of immanence. The triple ec-stasis that the
investigation of internal time-consciousness deploys is a betrayal of
the original presence that the revelation of life unveils. Indeed, the
second point that should be emphasised is that life is without dis-
20 EM, p. 41.
21 EM, p. 42.
22 EM, p. 467.
tance, or division, and this is precisely what distinguishes material

phenomenology from ontological monism. In the light of a radical
immanence, temporal flowing is a misconception of subjectivity
and its inner production, which is not tautological, nor alienating.
The invisible life is not constituted within time, insofar as there is
no difference from itself that can introduce a dimensional perspec-
tive upon immanence. No division is to be found within imma-
nence as it ‘does not divide itself, it does not separate itself from
itself, no distance is instituted between it and itself ’23. The absence
of opposition results from this inability to posit anything in front
of immanence, as this division would degenerate in a new form of
communality. Describing immanence in terms that refute expecta-
tion, Henry affirms that the essence ‘is without project and without
desire’24, resting in a perfect tranquillity, non-disturbed by other-
ness. In its solitude, immanence is characterised as unity. Yet, this
unity is not Husserl’s synthesis of identification through variations,
because the essence does not change, ‘there is nothing in it which it
is not already’25. As no distance can be taken with regard to itself,
the immanence is pure passivity, non-freedom, insofar as it cannot
assume itself, identical to the Levinasian election of the same by
the other in a responsibility that cannot be assumed. The essence
cannot take ‘a free point of view with regard to itself ’26, and this is
again a sign that a phenomenology of singularity ambiguously sug-
gests a contamination of the imperative by the constitutive order.
The immanence hides itself from the world: the invisibility is, to a
certain extent, a dissimulation in the context of exterior visibility.
23 EM, p. 283.
24 EM, p. 284.
25 EM, p. 287.
26 EM, p. 338.
As Henry signals it, the invisible is described as modesty, in its re-

fusal to appropriate the visibility of the world27.
To sum up, what are the major characteristics that define life
as singularity? Firstly, the invisible cannot be comparative because
no synthesis brings it into communality with a different term. That
is to say, the invisible immanence is non-synthetisable, refuting a
more general totality, or even common characteristics with another
realm (the visible). As Henry expresses it, ‘deprived of the light
which arises in the horizon opened by transcendence, and funda-
mentally foreign to this light which belongs to the world (…) it
rather remains in the night and becomes penetrated by it’28. But
the night is not a milieu that includes invisibility: it is this invis-
ibility as such, its phenomenal dimension. Secondly, the invisible
is non-synthetic in itself; it does not participate in divisions, or in
internal syntheses of association and temporal flowing. It is in this
sense that the essence is radical immanence, bound up through an
original affection to itself. To quote Henry, in immanence there
is a unique possibility ‘of affecting itself without the mediation of
a sense, which always designates the affection by something for-
eign’29. That it to say, the self-feeling by the self is compact, with
no fissure. Furthermore, the essence is nothing else but this self-
feeling, where the self and the feeling coincide. Nonetheless, this
self-experiencing is also non-tautological and does not involve an
operation of identification. Despite its impossible identification,
immanence is not an empty pole: life has an interior richness and,
even if ‘oblivious to the splitting of opposition’30, the immanence is
production, suffering, and pathos.
27 EM, p. 382.
28 EM, p. 438.
29 EM, p. 461.
30 EM, p. 476.
1. The non-contextual singularity of life

a. On indifference
With Levinas: going beyond identity and difference
In order to substantiate the general claims that we have made
about life as singularity, we will discuss, in the following two sections,
the complex arguments that Henry constructs in favour of our pre-
liminary characterisation of immanence as being non-synthetisable
and non-synthetic. Firstly, we will draw on considerations that refer
to the possibility of integrating life into wider contexts, that is to say,
of subordinating life to a more encompassing form of commonality.
Subsequently, in the next section, the inner structure that forms the
substance of immanence is to be confronted with the possibility of
an inherent synthesis. In other words, a closer inspection will be di-
rected towards the issue of the possibility of life as totality.
The singular in phenomenology eludes both identity and differ-
ence. That is exactly the nature of the novelty that the phenomenol-
ogy of singularity introduces in contrast to totalitarian philosophical
visions, but also in contradistinction with an interest in difference.
According to its original impulse, the revelation of the singular is to
be understood as ‘non-indifference’ to the unique other, or indiffer-
ence to ecstatic visibility. But are not non-indifference, as Levinas
delimits it, and indifference, as Henry defines the relation of life to
ec-stasis, both annulments of difference? Is non-indifference not pos-
sible only as a defeat of any attempt to being-in-difference? ‘A rela-
tionship across absolute difference’31, as Levinas describes the revela-
tion of the other, presupposes the absence of any synoptic gaze and
of commonality. This enigmatic encounter of the other is a plot that
cannot refer to difference. It is only within the said that the anarchi-
31 Levinas, OBBE, p. 70.
cal signifies as absolute difference, risking the paradoxical formula-

tion of a barbarism. For Henry, life is also an eluding of the language
of the world: the original language of affectivity grasps the invisible
in its radical ‘indifference with respect to the visible’32.
The criticism that Henry mobilises against ontological monism
echoes the critical enterprise that Levinas offers under the heading
of a ‘beyond totality’, which opens ‘the desire for the invisible’33.
Faithful to the epiphany of a non-reversible relation, Levinas ex-
claims: ‘To die for the invisible – this is metaphysics’34! Likewise,
proclaiming the originality of the ‘light’ of the night, Henry re-
marks that ‘night is the reality of the essence’35, and ‘night is the
revelation of the essence of revelation’36. Thus, the invisible needs
to be separated, in non-in-difference, or through indifference, from
the visible that affects even phenomenological analyses. In the situ-
ation of an immanent life, the self-manifestation of the essence of
manifestation is presence to itself, Parousia, which gives access to
the origin. Thus, reiterating the effort to grasp the origin, Henry
notices that ‘the Parousia happens at the origin because it consti-
tutes its essence. Because it constitutes the essence of the origin, the
Parousia does not result from any progress, it is its presupposition’37.
This observation accompanies the critique of the representational
thought, and the implicit rejection of the epoché as distancing it-
self from life. Phenomenology is not original distance, a being-
outside-itself, but immanence, perfect coincidence. Strikingly,
both Levinas and Henry begin their examinations by criticising
32 EM, p. 543.
33 TI, p. 33.
34 TI, p. 35.
35 EM, p. 438.
36 EM, p. 439.
37 EM, p. 167.
unification, even in the form of opposition, or dialectical return of

the same, so that a more radical distancing can be installed. But,
while Levinas employs separation to describe non-communality
from the perspective of an absolute outside, Henry stresses that, in
its inability to enter syntheses, the foundation is self-revealing, self-
manifesting. In other words, ‘the essence of manifestation mani-
fests itself in itself and by itself and this in an original manner’38.
The dialectical erring into a being-outside-itself and the totality
that is inaugurated by the failure to transgress the being-total of a
synthetic thought cannot effect an exclusion of the transcendent
from immanence. Using images that resemble the ones adopted
by Levinas in the description of the other, immanence is afflicted
by indigence, situates itself in a realm of ontological parsimony.
Indeed, ‘the indigence of the essence resides in the fact that it en-
closes nothing else in itself ’39 because immanence is ignorant of the
other, and indifferent to transcendence.
The criticism that Henry addresses concerning the possibility
to integrate life into a broader synthetic grasp is based on the as-
sumption that there is no common ground between visibility, or
transcendence, and invisibility, or immanence. This means that
Henry has to distance himself from a dualistic40 view that would
entitle an other pole to challenge the uniqueness of life, and, at the
same time, from an identification of contraries that would install a
38 EM, p. 169.
39 EM, p. 282.
40 G. Van Riet, art.cit., also observes that Henry is obliged to start with a
type of heterogeneity that is dualistic. Yet, this dualism has to be reduced
again to a unity, but ‘not in the sense that ego and non-ego would form
two regions that could ultimately be included in a wider assemblage, or
dialectically re-linked’ (p. 451). That is to say, Henry has to find a way, so
that heterogeneity is maintained without a dialectical synthesis, or a more
radical difference.
higher level of generality. As he cannot negate that there is an inten-

tional visibility, the point is then to describe a ‘relation’ of radical
difference that does not contradict the pre-eminence of life, or the
absence of distance. The task seems to be self-defeating, but Henry
finds a way out of this difficulty through the notion of ‘indifference’.
Before him, Merleau-Ponty attempted to solve the problematic issue
of dualism and, at first sight, the two accounts seem to respond to
the same question. As we have proceeded previously to the definition
of singularity by means of a confrontation with Husserl’s ideas, we
will employ the same strategy in the case of elucidating the relation
between the visible and the invisible. The conflicting interpretation
will be, in this case, the one offered by Merleau-Ponty, which equally
includes a non-acceptance of pure difference, or identity. But is his
account adequate for a clarification of singularity?
Merleau-Ponty: the non-dualism of the visible and the

invisible
Merleau-Ponty can be considered to be a predecessor of the
non-dualistic relation between the visible and the invisible to
the extent that his last work is declared to be a reworking of the
Cartesian dualism, ‘the “strabism” of Western ontology’41, which
also marks phenomenology. In a confrontation with dualistic phi-
losophies, Merleau-Ponty focuses his attention on Sartre’s account
of the relation between Being and Nothingness in order to reveal
a different modality of approaching dialectic. As Merleau-Ponty
notices, Sartre operates in his inquiry with a radical mode of op-
position. To ‘Being as absolute plenitude and absolute positivity’,
Sartre opposes ‘myself as negativity’42, stressing the idea that the
41 Merleau-Ponty, VI, p. 166.
42 VI, p. 52.
two are to be described in an effort to radicalise the separation

between consciousness and the world. Overcoming the traditional
opposition between in-itself and for-itself, Sartre endeavours to
solve the antinomy by opting for absolute difference. Indeed, Being
and Nothingness cannot be brought to contradiction because they
do not belong to a realm of commonality. Reminiscent of Levinas’s
examination of radical difference, the opposition between Being
and Nothingness is not that between two beings, and that is the
reason why no common ground can be instituted. The distinction
is to remain insurmountable. But, for Merleau-Ponty, the opposi-
tion imposed by this account of negativity returns to the assump-
tions of a positivist thought. Indeed, ‘as absolutely opposed, Being
and Nothingness are indiscernible. It is the absolute non-existence
of Nothingness that makes it need Being and makes it hence be
not visible except in the guise of “lakes of non-being”’43. Whereas
ambiguity and the unveiling of multiple singularities represent, for
Levinas, the potential answer to this criticism, for Sartre radical dif-
ference defeats itself and defects its original inspiration.
A ‘good’ dialectic
As Merleau-Ponty remarks, Sartre’s account ‘begins by oppos-
ing being and nothingness absolutely, and it ends by showing that
the nothingness is in a way within being’44. Nevertheless, the ma-
jor observation that this critical enterprise offers is the impossibility
of fixing absolute difference as a thesis. For the radical separation
to be disclosed, a certain unsettling perspective in the description
of the absolute difference is required. As Levinas rightfully notes,
within the said of the description, the difference ‘is experienced pre-
43 VI, p. 66.
44 VI, p. 66.
cisely by incessantly running up against it, and crossing over its own
contestation’45. That is also Merleau-Ponty’s allegation in favour of a
good dialectic: ‘dialectic is unstable (…), it is even essentially and by
definition unstable, so that it has never been able to formulate itself
into these without denaturing itself’46. Sartre’s example is, therefore,
an illustration of bad dialectic because in it, each term recalls its op-
posite, integrating itself into a more encompassing totality. In this
respect, Sartre’s negativist thought ‘establishes between nothingness
and being a massive cohesion’47. A complex totalitarian view installs
itself when opposition turns into a thesis.
To account for the veritable dimension of a dialectical thought,
Merleau-Ponty suggests that a different sort of language is demand-
ed, i.e. a situational speaking, or even silence. Thus, hinting at good
dialectic, he asserts that ‘if one wishes to maintain its spirit it is per-
haps necessary to not even name it’48. It is interesting to note that
the dysfunctional dimension of language is already a sign announc-
ing the turn, within recent phenomenology, to the barbarism of an
otherwise than said. For this new language, a thought in contact with
being is required. Furthermore, ‘the sort of being to which it refers,
and which we have been trying to indicate, is in fact not susceptible
of being designated positively’49. Thus, the dialectical thought that
Merleau-Ponty envisages cannot be asserted in theses; it has to be
ambiguous, escaping both identity and absolute opposition because,
unlike Hegel and Sartre, the opposites are to be kept apart and not to
inaugurate a higher level of positivity. Denouncing a non-situational
dialectic, Merleau-Ponty affirms: ‘there is no good dialectic but that
45 OBBE, p. 154.
46 VI, p. 92.
47 VI, p. 70.
48 VI, p. 92.
49 VI, p. 92.
which criticises itself and surpasses itself as a separate statement’50.

Distinguished from assertive thought, this hyper-dialectic is a ‘dia-
lectic without synthesis’51.
A ‘chiasmatic’ invisible
Thus, the invisible, for Merleau-Ponty, is not the opposite of the
visible, but part of it, as the visible itself exists only through the in-
filtration of the invisible within itself. Indeed, displacing each other,
‘the invisible is not the contradictory of the visible: the visible itself
has an invisible inner framework (membrure), and the in-visible is
the secret counterpart of the visible, it appears only within it’52. It
seems, thus, that the distinction between the visible and the in-
visible cannot be accomplished unless they tend to become their
other. The appearing of the world, the coming out of its obscurity
into the visible is rendered possible by the opening of visibility to the
wild and amorphous Being. The chiasm captures this co-functioning
of the visible and the invisible. Thus, the invisible is not a non-visible
because, in a paradoxical way, the invisible is always halfway between
itself and the visible. Similarly, there is an exchange with regard to
the visible, which ‘is pregnant with the invisible’53. In the case of the
body that sees itself as visible, it is the distance between the exterior
visible and my own body as visible that permits the visible to appear.
The body in the world is the example that illustrates that between the
visible and the invisible the relation is one of ‘embrace’. Moreover,
between the two, ‘there is not a frontier, but a contact surface’54.
There is, thus, a prolongation of the one that sees into the visible
50 VI, p. 94.
51 VI, p. 94.
52 VI, p. 215.
53 VI, p. 216.
54 VI, p. 271.
and an invisible part inside the body55 that sees itself as visible. In the
body-world relation, good dialectic, as permanent annulment of its
own position, is present: ‘there are no longer “syntheses”, there is a
contact with being through its modulations, or its relief’56. Otherwise
stated, there is no thetic thought, but only a particular thickness that
defines flesh. In it, ‘the visible is invisible’57, whereas the invisible can
only be understood in its relation to the visible.
In the endeavour to concede to the invisible a phenomenologi-
cal status, Merleau-Ponty demands that the contact between the ap-
pearing to the seer and the thing in itself remain within the limits
of a hyper-dialectic. Displacing the idea of pure opposition, or ab-
solute difference, the chiasm can be better defined as an attempt to
approach ‘identity within difference’58. Therefore, despite its attack
against dualistic thought, Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology cannot be
considered as a description of the singular59. The equivalence that is
established between the visible and the invisible, the perfect symetry
that situates itself beyond the chiasm, signify that the singular could
never be grasped except through a continual reference to the general
55 On the relation that can be established between Merleau-Ponty’s treatment

of embodiment and Henry’s phenomenology of self-affection, Cf. also ‘Le
sens de l’auto-affection chez Merleau-Ponty et M. Henry’(Ch. VI, R. Bar-
baras, Le tournant de l’expérience, Paris, Vrin, 1998, pp. 137-155).
56 VI, p. 269.
57 VI, p. 220.
58 VI, p. 225. Cf. also Henry’s comments about the chiasm in I, esp. §21, §22
and §23, pp. 163-180.
59 As R. Breeur remarks in his article ‘Merleau-Ponty, un sujet désingularisé’
(Revue philosophique de Louvain, 96, 1998, pp.232-253), Merleau-Ponty is
not able to offer an account of the singularity of the subject. It is rather the
case that an impersonal subjectivity is in place in Merleau-Ponty’s phenom-
enology. Though Breeur seems to operate, in a first instance, with a subjec-
tive understanding of singularity, similar to the one that Husserl deploys
in his texts, there is a suggestion that the surplus that is presupposed in
the reversibility of the visible and the invisible can become the basis for a
conception of singularity in ontological terms.
and the communal. The visible is always the reverse side of the invis-
ible: this is the basis of the ‘ontology from within’60, in the ontology
that discovers the already present bond between the foundation and
that which it originates61. But, as we noted before, for a phenomenol-
ogy of singularity this decision is not enough: it constantly surpasses
itself towards a pre-original62, a more radical type of ‘relation’ that
60 VI, p. 237.
61 In her essay, ‘Thinking from within’ (Merleau-Ponty in Contemporary Per-
spective, J. Van der Veken & P. Burke eds., Dordrecht, Kluwer, 1993, pp.
25-35), F. Dastur correctly remarks that Merleau-Ponty’s ontology can-
not be founded on either absolute distance, or radical proximity. From
this perspective, he develops a thinking of the indivision that he defines as
embrace. Furthermore, the reversibility that forms the core of the chiasm
has to be ‘by its nature incomplete’ since, were it to become accomplished,
it would entail a loss of the visible, or of the invisible (p. 29). But, there is
no absolute visibility and neither a radical and complete invisibility. How-
ever, is it legitimate to affirm that this reversal itself, which is Being in its
brute dimension, can form a higher order singularity? On this matter, let
us recall R. Barbaras’s observation (De l’ être du phénomène. Sur l’ontologie
de Merleau-Ponty, Grenoble, Millon, 1991, esp. ch. ‘Le chiasme dernier’,
pp. 345-354) that Being cannot possibly form a positive unity between the
visible and the invisible. Being is diversity, ‘proliferation of chiasmi’ (p.352)
and, thus, ‘the unity of Being has sense only as an unity that is not posited
(…) as an identity that is equally a difference’ (p.351). On the basis of this
observation, Being is unveiled as including an inner split. However, one
can say that Henry’s account of Life, which will be examined in the next
section, also allows for an inner division to take place within the singular-
ity of the immanence. Yet, the major difference is that the division is not
based on distance; it is rather pure identity and self-affection. The inner
space does not create contraries, but mere identity.
62 On this point, F. Ciaremelli’s article ‘L’originaire et l’immédiat. Re-
marques sur Heidegger et le dernier Merleau-Ponty’ (Revue philosophique
de Louvain, 96, 1998, pp. 198-231) should be mentioned. Noticing a re-
formulation of the question of origin in Merleau-Ponty’s last work, Ciare-
melli opposes Heidegger’s direct and immediate intuition of the origin to
Merleau-Ponty’s indirect and oblique ontology. Merleau-Ponty is aware of
the impossibility of grasping the origin in its originality, by means of a di-
rect apprehension. The ‘ontology from within’ echoes the idea that there is
does not relate to the visible. In fact, the pre-original is the defeat
of every privileged position, an attempt to turn to the simulacrum,
which, as Deleuze stresses, is the end of a participation philosophy63.
The synthetic thought that couples the model and its copy, or the
origin and the originated, is rejected by the idea of a pre-original.
Still, the positive point of Merleau-Ponty’s analysis is the fact that the
visible and the invisible are not pre-formed before the chiasm puts
them in contact with each other. Thus, the visible is not ‘perfectly
defined’ before one introduces the problematic of the invisible; on
the contrary, ‘one has to understand that it is the visibility itself that
involves a non-visibility’64. It is with regard to this prior decision that
a phenomenology of singularity distinguishes itself, as we have already
remarked when discussing Levinas’s commitment to the other as pre-
ceding phenomenology, as being ‘theological’. For the singular to ap-
pear, a certain a-symmetry is necessary.
The monist reversibility of the chiasm

Henry also rejects the opposition that Sartre establishes be-
tween a Being-for-itself and a Being-in-itself on the basis of the
fact that it embodies a hidden form of monism. Indeed, follow-
ing Merleau-Ponty’s line of thought, Henry considers separation,
no direct access to the origin, due to an original dispossession. To support
this idea, let us quote from In Praise of Philosophy (Evanston, Northwestern
University Press, 1963). There, it is asserted that ‘the relation of the philoso-
pher to being is not the frontal relation of the spectator to the spectacle; it is a
kind of complicity, an oblique and clandestine relationship’ (p. 15). Accord-
ingly, the origin, as invisible, has to be approached through the visible, but
this visible is always inhabited by a core of invisibility, as the invisible itself
is another face of the visible. Thus, the access to the origin it to be achieved
through an indirect grasp. But, insofar as Merleau-Ponty’s ontology is based
on the interval, he is a thinker of the origin rather than of the pre-original.
63 Cf. Deleuze, DR, pp. 68-69.
64 VI, p. 247.
division, or alienation, as the most compelling mark of a vicious

form of correlation. According to ontological monism, there is an
intricate cohesion between consciousness and Being-in-the-world,
and the unity that is affirmed behind the necessary alienation is, in
fact, an incongruous dependence of the invisible on exterior being.
In this sense, ontological monism postulates that ‘consciousness
itself is noting other than the alienation of Being, namely Being
as such’65. In conformity with this understanding, consciousness
has been deceptively described as sustaining, within itself, the same
splitting and alienating drive. Therefore, consciousness begins
to delimit itself as representation and duplication. This division,
which installs two terms within the subject, repeats the assump-
tions of a philosophy of Being. That is to say, opposition is always
the basis for a more encompassing synthesis. In phenomenology,
the duplication of consciousness is caused by the intentional orien-
tation towards an objective correlate and by a fading of the char-
acteristics of immanence within transcendence. Yet, the distance is
fusion: ‘the subjectivity of the subject is merely the objectivity of
the object’66. Indeed, even Cartesian dualism is nothing else than
a mere variation of ontological monism67. To sum up, the invis-
ible is comprehended within ontological monism as a modifica-
tion of visibility, as the lowest degree of manifestation in the light.
The necessary bond that unites the two remains acute even in the
case of opposition and the general norm is that ‘the subject knows
itself only through the object’68. Insofar as Merleau-Ponty69 still
operates with reversibility and an image of exchange, the dualism
65 EM, p. 78.
66 EM, p. 90.
67 EM, p. 99.
68 EM, p. 111.
69 For another critical reading of Merleau-Ponty, Cf. also M. Henry, ‘Le concept
d’âme a-t-il un sens?’, in Revue philosophique de Louvain, 64, 1966, pp. 5-33.
of traditional phenomenology is not eluded. Even if not dialec-

tical in the restrictive sense of the term, the phenomenology of
Merleau-Ponty is yet another restitution of duality, not of a static,
but of an unstable one70. The synthesis is realised, once more, un-
der the common texture of the flesh, or on the basis of the chiasm.
Returning now to Henry’s version of phenomenality, the relation
with the visible is no longer affected by a reversing movement,
but maintains itself as heterogeneity within indifference. Similar
to the chiasmatic one, the immanent invisible is not an opposing,
negative force but ‘is the mode of a positive and truly fundamen-
tal revelation’71. Mistaken for another case of Being-in-the-world,
as Merleau-Ponty ascertains it, the invisible has been tradition-
ally subordinated, even within phenomenological perspectives, to
visibility. It is the ecstatic visibility that sustains the intertwin-
ing of the visible and the invisible, because the reversibility that
Merleau-Ponty stresses is, in fact, that of the seen and of the seer.
But, for Henry, ‘flesh is prior to the chiasm’72, preceding, from ‘be-
fore times’, the visible. Related to the reinterpretation of the chiasm
is also the tripartite nature of the body that Henry introduces in
order to supplement the distinction between the constituted and
the constitutive body with the reality of an original flesh. Rejecting
70 As it is not our purpose to offer a historical exemplification of a phenom-
enology of singularity, we will not offer a final conclusion on whether or
not Merleau-Ponty’s thought can be illustrative, to a higher degree, to our
discussions of the singular. There is a possibility to relate some of his intu-
itions to an account on singularity: namely, his rejection of dualism and the
idea of Being as ultimate foundation, situated beyond difference and identity.
However, his phenomenology is better described as a thinking of continual
reversal and contamination of the visible and the invisible. Their rupture or
their identity is not radical enough to reveal a singularity, even if the chiasm
is definitely a remarkable contribution to the bridging of synthetic thought.
71 EM, p. 44.
72 I, p. 197.
Husserl’s description of the duality characterising Körper and Leib

as being incomplete and situated within the visible, Henry declares
that the constitutive/constituted relation maintains a mundane ap-
proach to flesh. Opposing this account, Henry reveals a more origi-
nal flesh, non-intentional and non-ecstatic. The chiasm has to be
revised in light of this complex scheme which situates the original
flesh beyond the role of origin, or constitutive pole.
However, Henry recognises that we can find in Merleau-Ponty’s
phenomenology ‘something like a presentiment of the philosophy of
immanence’73 when he identifies visibility with thought and exteri-
ority. Yet, Merleau-Ponty’s thinking is still object-oriented insofar as
the alternative of a primordial co-presence focuses on the horizon of
the world and on our access to it. Modelling phenomenality on the
appearing of the world, Merleau-Ponty does not escape the distance
that returns the invisible to the visible. In a paradoxical way, the du-
alism infiltrates within the chiasm and conciliates, dialectically, the
terms into syntheses. For Henry, this means that ‘we again see a type
of thought, whose most noteworthy aim was to escape it, falling back
into the dualism of the this and that’74.
Surpassing difference through indifference

To return to the relation between the invisible and the visible,
what renders Henry’s exposition significant is the idea of an indif-
ference existing between the two. In fact, the accentuation of indif-
ference can be considered as a recovering of the phenomenological
reduction in its classical form. Indeed, the bracketing of being that
Husserl presents through the reduction can be found in Henry’s in-
sistence on the indifference that relates the invisible to the visible.
73 EM, p. 375.
74 EM, p. 377.
On this observation, we can also recall Marion’s version of the reduc-

tion: ‘the gaze of boredom neither denies nor affirms it [the being];
it abandons, so far as to abandon itself, with neither love nor hate,
through pure indifference’75. The boredom that Marion highlights is
identical to the indifference that relates the visible and the invisible
and functions as a suspension of all the interests that can relate us
back to being. Boredom, or indifference, is the name of this lack of
interest: ‘boredom withdraws from every interest that would make it
enter among (inter) beings (interest)’76. It is also remarkable to note
that the indifference described by Marion as boredom is a reduc-
tion that returns, through the suspension of the visible, to a ‘before
whatever may be’77. In this respect, indifference is a complete reduc-
tion: it absolves itself from interests, or from idols, in order to deploy
pre-eminence. The putting into question operated by indifference
unveils the original status of the invisible because, to refer again to
Marion’s texts, the gaze of boredom ‘exceeds the world only by taking
it into view from another pole’78.
Thus, far from being antithetic (‘the invisible is not the antitheti-
cal concept of the visible’79), the invisible is neither dialectical. The
bond that unites the opposites presupposes homogeneity because ‘a
whale is not opposed to an equation’, and, thus, the affinity between
contraries implies communality80. When opposed to the visible, the
invisible fuses with its antithetic term through a dialectical bond.
Even the good dialectic understood as perpetual oscillation and in-
capacity of decision is not to be accepted, because a more obtrusive
form of community guides the continuous passage from one term
to the other. That is to say, the teleological progression of a good
75 Marion, God without being. Hors-texte, p. 116.
76 Marion, GB, p. 118.
79 EM, p. 444.
80 EM, p. 444.
dialectic that aspires to return the invisible to the visible. The passage
is fluid, making possible non-separation81. On the contrary, the vis-
ible and the invisible ‘have nothing similar and consequently cannot
enter into the common genre of a more general essence nor can they
be subsumed by it’82.
As far as difference is concerned, life has an undoubted pre-emi-
nence: it exists prior to difference because difference is always ecstatic
and rooted in a separation from itself. In traditional phenomenology,
the difference is double: there is division between that which appears
and the horizon of its appearing, but also difference between that
which appears and its own appearing. Returning to the theme of in-
difference, it is not only pure immanence that is indifferent to ecsta-
sis. It is also this exposition in transcendence that manifests indiffer-
ence to, and ignorance of life: ‘the appearing through the Difference
of the world, does not only exhibit that which thus appears as being
different, [the former] is in principle totally indifferent with regard to
[the latter]’83. This neutrality with regard to life is a ‘there is’, which,
as its Levinasian analogue, embodies the way in which things appear
in the light of vision.
Introducing the idea of difference as indifference, Henry accen-
tuates the necessity of heterogeneity between the visible and the in-
visible. As he maintains, ‘no passage, no time binds them together,
but they subsist apart from one another, each in the positivity84 of it-
sown effectiveness’85. Responding indirectly to the proposal of a chi-
81 EM, p. 446.
82 EM, p. 447.
83 I, p. 60.
84 While Deleuze considers that the negative involved in indifference cannot
capture the phenomenon of difference (Cf. DR, p. 52), the indifference that
Henry evokes is precisely the very nature of affirmation. Thus, Henry, like
Deleuze, attempts to conceive difference beyond negation, as pure positiv-
ity, in order to formulate an adequate approach to singularities.
85 EM, p. 448.
asmatic encounter, Henry sustains an ‘opposition of that which has no

bond’86, an absolute difference in the sense in which, being absolute,
in annuls the possibility of differing. That is why, ‘such an opposi-
tion, in absolute difference, is that of indifference’. In this perspective,
without combat or frontal confrontation, the invisible ‘remains in it-
self and entirely occupied with self, it ignores the visible and cannot
know it’87. Indifference is, hence, that which defines real opposition.
Henry finds an illustration of this relation in the Christian antinomy
embodied in the saying: ‘Render to the Caesar what belongs to the
Caesar and to God what belongs to God’88.
b. Ec-stases of the invisible

After demarcating the non-contextual nature of the invisibility
of life, several critical points have to be taken into consideration.
More precisely, we have to clarify the explanation offered by Henry
to the nature of the visible, and to validate the indifferent relation
that life has with the transcendent pole of ec-stasis. To start with,
let us examine the possibility of a phenomenology of the invisible.
Subsequently, several points of intersection between life and tran-
scendence will be disclosed.
A ‘phenomenology’ of the invisible

The employment of the metaphor of the invisible in phenom-
enology seems to be contrary to the most fundamental character-
istic of the project, since its relatedness to light and appearing is
essentially bound to its definition. As Heidegger outlines in §7
86 EM, p. 448.
87 EM, p. 448.
88 EM, p. 449.
of Sein und Zeit, the Greek ‘phainomenon’ signifies exactly ‘that

which shows itself, or the manifest’, being, thus, correlated with an
attempt to bring something to the light of the day89. The metaphor
of light implies that the phenomenon can be also defined as the
‘visible in itself ’. Accordingly, Henry’s question about the possibil-
ity of a phenomenology of the invisible90 (‘is there not a contradic-
tion in these terms?’91) is legitimate and meaningful. But the obses-
sive recourse to the image of invisibility is equally significant. To
illustrate, Heidegger himself introduces a ‘phenomenology of the
inapparent’ in order to unveil the specificity of Being. Levinas de-
scribes the diachronic transcendence as ‘immemorial, unrepresent-
able, invisible’92, underlining the idea that ‘the non-present here
is the invisible’. The trace of the infinite manifests also a dimen-
sion of invisibility, ‘as though the invisible that bypasses the pres-
ent left a trace by the very fact of bypassing the present’93. Turning
to the invisible is motivated by a continuous dissatisfaction with
phenomenology delimited as examination of the appearing and as
monstration. From this perspective, both Levinas and Henry pre-
fer to use the image of exposure and nudity in order to grasp the
phenomenal aspect of invisibility. To the ‘exposedness of a skin laid
bare’94, Henry mirrors the suffering of life as pathos, ‘in its nudity,
89 Cf. also Henry, CV, p. 23; PM, p. 112ff; I, p. 35ff.
90 D. Zahavi (‘Michel Henry and the phenomenology of the invisible’, in
Continental Philosophy Review, 32, 1999, pp. 232-240) stresses also the
turn, in recent French phenomenology, towards the invisible, which at-
tests, though, a constant concern in phenomenology (for e.g., Heidegger’s
‘phenomenology of the inapparent’).
91 PM, p. 8.
92 OBBE, p. 11.
93 OBBE, p. 12.
94 OBBE, p. 49.
in its naivety, in its total exposure, in its pure self-experience’95. A

radical phenomenology is required to seize upon the invisible and
the singularity that it manifests.
Still, how can we encompass the invisibility of life by means of
a phenomenological account? In order to achieve this givenness,
Henry imposes, as we have already seen, a reinterpretation of tradi-
tional phenomenology to oppose its ecstatic method to the object
of phenomenology. Furthermore, the method itself has to reveal a
type of objectification that is self-objectification, and not media-
tion through the ‘outside’ structure of the visible96. The strategy
that Henry applies with regard to the objectification of life is based
on the assumption that visibility is originally an archi-revelation,
an invisible self-affection. In other words, phenomenology is pos-
sible because the Saying of Life is responsible for revealing the said
to itself. Thus, phenomenology means ‘seeing by showing in what
it says the one of which it says’97. The nature of the original Saying
compels us to put the Greek logos into an invisible perspective.
But, as Henry remarks, ‘that the seeing of the method (…) always
sustains within itself, like its foundational anti-essence, the pathetic
plenitude of life, does not repudiate [the possibility] that it nev-
er sees it’98. Exposing the aporetic aspects of Husserl’s work, due
mainly to the impossibility to resolve the spurious duality between
the visible and the invisible, Henry appeals to a phenomenology
of life that would explore the invisible, following the idea that ‘the
invisible precedes every conceivable visible’99. Phenomenology has
95 Henry, ‘Material phenomenology and language (or, pathos and language)’,
(in Continental Philosophy Review, 32, 1999, pp. 343-65), p. 355.
96 PM, p. 129.
97 PM, p. 131.
98 PM, p. 134.
99 I, p. 132.
a new task: an enlargement of the concept of phenomenality is de-

manded in order to surpass the aporia of an ec-static vision.
A barbarous invisible
Henry captures the visualisation of the invisible in the relation
between barbarism, as refusal of life, and the pathos of self-expe-
rience. For Henry, life cannot be given to appearance because ‘life
has no face’100. Immanence is invisible: it has no exterior image to
offer and, as in the case of art, a plastic aspect can only symbolise
the absence of that which hides itself beyond imaginary representa-
tions101. But how can we then explain the barbaric decline of life?
The major hint that we find in Henry’s text is the consideration of
barbarism as ‘an illness of the life itself ’102. Though life excludes
exteriority and is never intentional in its essence, its absolute im-
manence can degenerate because of a surplus that is not directed
towards self-enhancement. However, barbarism is always subordi-
nated: it cannot be original, as culture is, and cannot have a direct
rapport to life itself. It is interesting to note that Henry goes to such
an extreme that, similar to Husserl’s hypothesis of the annulment
of the world, he envisages a radical form of reduction. The scenario
of a life without anything else around it, not even the possibility
of a world, manifests clearly the fact that Henry does not accept
dialogical terms between life and barbarism. Indeed, to quote him,
‘there would be life even if nothing other were in the world, or,
100 B, p. 69.
101 Cf. also ‘the invisible life that has neither figure nor face, neither inside nor
outside, neither front nor behind, neither angle nor side or surface, neither
an exterior aspect, nor any face of its being, turned towards an outside,
given to a gaze’, B, p. 53.
102 B, p. 40.
rather, even if there were no world at all’103. Consequently, the de-

cline of life is not necessary, as the intentional projection towards
something exterior is nothing but a mere accident in the economy
of life’s self-production. So, how does barbarism come to life? Or,
rather, how does life come to barbarism?
Life is not a monotonous self-repetition, but is self-varying and
diverse even if no distance is ever produced within its radical, im-
manent self. Indeed, as we will see more clearly in the next subsec-
tion104, the absolute self-affecting life is pathos, and passion, self-
suffering and self-explosion. In opposition, science and technologi-
cal barbarism subordinate this self-development to stable entities
which relate to each other by means of synthetic unities. This is the
beginning of a mortification of life, since its living essence is artifi-
cially separated from the sensibility of self-affection. Nevertheless,
Henry cannot accept any duality in the self-realisation of life and,
thus, the denial of life has to be regarded as another form of life.
That is to say, science, even if estranging itself from life, is still a
modality of absolute immanence105. In this sense, barbarism is a
paradoxical form of life as it is both a mode of life, and its nega-
tion. Translated otherwise, visibility is the self-denial of invisibil-
ity, the immanence that condemns itself to being a contradiction.
Objectified, life is unreal, object of an ‘aberrant project’106.
The most appropriate expression of life’s self-denial is aporia.
Indeed, in his Material Phenomenology, Henry notices that phe-
nomenology, when it has to bring to visibility the invisible nature
of life, engenders an aporetic givenness107, due mainly to the im-
possibility to represent life in itself. To the same extent, the barbaric
103 B, p. 31.
104 ‘The non-synthetic life’, p. 183ff.
105 B, p. 102.
106 B, p. 152.
107 PM, pp. 123, 126, 127.
culture is an aporetic reality. The unemployed energy of life, which

is teleologically oriented towards self-preservation and self-fulfil-
ment, remains immobilised in itself and produces malaise and in-
creasing despair. As a result of this self-suffering, life explodes into
that outside to ease the energy that has been accumulated without
being re-employed.
The transcendent ego, or the son of the world

Echoing the same issue, the distinction between immanence
and transcendence offers another expression of the indifferent rela-
tion between the two. Thus, in an earlier text, Henry notices that
immanent life founds transcendence and is at the same time not
distinguished from it but merely the same. Using the image of ab-
solute proximity, which Levinas also employs when referring to
radical distance, Henry observes that the idea of duality has a com-
pletely special value when used to characterise the ultimate struc-
tures of being: it does not signify, as we understand it commonly, a
duality of two terms within the same ontological region, but rather
the absence of every duality108.
Thus, there is an ontic duality that cannot be confused with
the ontological one and which allows for transcendence and imma-
nence to come together. However, even Henry admits that there is
a radical difficulty in understanding how the absolute ego, which
is pure immanence and self-sufficiency, can become a transcendent
being. Without abolishing the aporetic nature of his explanation109,
108 PPC, p. 162.
109 Two possible reactions can be underlined on this matter. Firstly, F.-D. Seb-
bah, ‘Éveil et naissance. Quelques remarques à partir d’Emmanuel Lévinas’
(Alter, 1, 1993, pp. 213-239) points to the frustrating style that Henry devel-
ops in his texts, raising the question: ‘is that not a pure tautology, re-turned
in all senses, an unbreakable discourse because strictly auto-referential?’ (p.
Henry goes back to the affirmation that, even as transcendent, the

ego still has an immanent foundation. Thus, the ontological dig-
nity of absolute subjectivity imposes a subordination of transcen-
dence to the transcendental life of the subject.
In his later work, I am the Truth, the same question of the de-
pendence of the transcendent ego on the invisibility of life, which
takes here a dramatic theological justification, draws near to the
idea of a transcendence, ‘present in every immanent modality of
life’110. The explanation revolves around the distinction between
being a singular self, and being an ego or, between experiencing
oneself as son of God, and being a ego in the world. The process of
occultation of life that Henry envisages is based on the idea that be-
ing in the world is an ignorance of the fact of being an I, similar in
its singularity to the First Living. The self, engendered by Life’s self-
affection, is a singular lived in the accusative. That is, the self knows
itself as non-self-generated, as passive and yet as self-experiencing
itself as life. In this self-affection, which a weak form of affection,
the self is immediately bound to the self-generation of the absolute
Life, to the Ipseity of Christ. However, the self discovers its agency
and the power of being active, its condition of an ‘I can’, which sig-
nifies that the I is in self-possession. This is the moment when the ego
is produced. Nonetheless, Henry remains firm on this point: ‘there is
no ego but that of the Son, i.e. of a living, transcendental me [moi],
generated in the absolute, phenomenological Life’111. Transcendental
illusion, the doubling of the self is still problematic. Suggesting that
213). In reply, though not invalidating it, X. Tilliette’s declaration in ‘Mi-
chel Henry: la philosophie de la vie’ (Philosophie, 15, 1987, pp. 3-20): ‘the
impression of a tautology and of a pleonasm is erroneous, it emerges out of
an idle reading’. Yet, the responsibility for a misleading interpretation has
to be shared, in this case, between the author and his reader.
110 CV, p. 256.
111 CV, p. 174.
transcendence, in the form of being in the world, appears through

the forgetfulness of life and the dissimulation of the invisible in the
ego, Henry cannot explain this ‘paradoxical’ situation, as he defines
it. Experiencing one’s own agency, the ego considers itself to be its
own origin. This ‘liberated’ ego, which is effected by the ipseity of
life, can return to life through a second birth. The transcendence is,
thus, not definitive, but recalls its essence: the immanent living in the
self-affection of life.
The idea of the double condition of man, as being in the world, and
as son of the Son, which is the later configuration of the vital problem
of the relation between visibility and invisibility, is very controversial.
Henry seems to hold a position to which he committed himself prior
to a phenomenological justification. Like Levinas, rejecting the realm
of the world in a reductive effort that dismisses contamination with
the mundane, Henry pre-determines his account (the image of pre-
determination in his phenomenology of Christianity is significant in
this sense). Similar to the election by the other that Levinas exposes,
the self-revealing immanence and the absolute invisibility of life are
recurrent in a manner that defies the constitutive in favour of a pre-
scriptive insinuation. But we will expand more on these problems
further on in the text, focusing now on another question.
Henry’s monism
The question now is whether Henry’s account provides another
type of monism112. Not a ‘transcendent’ one, but one that returns
112 This question has also been asked by some of Henry’s readers. Thus, G. Van
Riet, art.cit., considers that Henry ‘professes… an ontological monism, the
inverse of the one that he combats’ (p. 458), while B. Forthomme (‘L’épreuve
affective de l’autre selon Emmanuel Lévinas et Michel Henry’, Revue de
Métaphysique et de Morale, 91/1, 1986, pp. 90-114) compares Henry’s phe-
nomenology to the neo-platonic ‘henology’. More recently, S. Laoureux (‘De
l’auto-affection à l’auto-affection. Remarques sur l’expérience d’autrui dans
everything to immanence and invisibility? Aware, like Levinas, of the

impersonal nature of a third party, Henry establishes an oppressive
monologue of life that resembles that which it attempts to reject: a
totalitarian form of phenomenology. His philosophy of life brings to
focus ‘a life in the first person’113, though the inconveniences of such
a position are multiple. Indeed, as in the case of the singular other,
life cannot be brought to the neutrality of a mundane appearing, re-
maining immanent in a mysterious way, as if an article of faith were
demanded to institute this prior self-familiarity. Besides, life in the
first person can never alter itself through ecstatic syntheses, becom-
ing a habitual individual. It is rather the case that the being in the
world of a habitual ego is an occultation of life in its self-coincidence.
Immanence is unique and without distance from itself, self-affecting
in a non-historical manner. As a result, life cannot be individual.
Paradoxically, life as first-person self-affection bears striking similari-
ties to a ‘generalised’ singularity. However, life is never general and
cannot be taken to constitute a universal entity in which individuals
participate in order to determine their inner essence. It is this last
aspect that has to be discussed in the perplexing rapport between
life and living beings. If the monistic dimension of immanence is
not solved by an ecstatic challenge from the ‘outside’, let us consider
Henry’s arguments in favour of the inner productivity of life and the
way in which the monos can generate multiplicity.
3. The non-synthetic life

To recall our definition, singularity is a unique and non-synthetic
entity, which can neither be subordinated to wider syntheses, nor
la phénoménologie de Michel Henry’, Alter, 7, 1999, pp. 149-168) raises the
following question: ‘is the ontological dualism that Henry wants to expose,
with such strength, not another monism where only the immanence projects
itself into being, [and] the transcendence into non-being?’ (p. 153, note 18).
113 PPC, p. 272.
encompass inner fragmentation. The preceding subsection showed

that the invisible cannot be part of higher syntheses, nor can life have
commonality with another constitutive pole. On the basis of this
conclusion, we can now turn to the inner structure of life in order to
analyse Henry’s arguments in favour of considering immanence as a
non-synthetic unity. The singular is not only exclusive of syntheses
in the sense that it represents the most encompassing generality; it
is also the ultimate element, the non-compounded and non-divided
foundation. In this subsection we will have to investigate the alleged
singularity of life as regards its inner production.
The community with the other life

The explanation that a philosophy of life can offer as to the
givenness of the other is essential for the understanding of life’s
inner structure, as well as for the rejection of a major accusation
menacing Henry’s account: that of being a reversion into monism.
Henry resolves this issue, which is addressed in the critical approach
to the Fifth Cartesian Meditation, by pointing to an inter-pathetic
life114. In this sense, an alter ego cannot be anything else but an
original ego, i.e. pure immanence that constitutes itself without
distance or intentional insight. Thus, the other cannot ever be
grasped through intentional relations; it is an impressional rapport
that reveals the other as life. Inter-subjective, the encounter of the
other is a self-discovering, in the first person, of the subject as life.
On the impossible understanding of the other in terms of visibility,
Henry declares that ‘nobody has ever seen a human being, …nobody
has ever seen his body, if, at least, by “body” we understand the real
body [the flesh]’115. The ego and the alter ego belong together to the
114 PM, p. 141. Cf. also CV, p. 309ff.
115 I, p. 221.
ultimate foundation of subjectivity: they are both immanent lives.

Unnoticed by Husserl because of the perceptive model that he ap-
plies to the relation with the other116, the concrete encounter of the
alter ego does not presuppose separation between the two. Somehow
this relation has already taken place when a representational thought,
or an intentional explanation, comes to create the split between liv-
ing beings. Similarly, Henry considers that a community is an enig-
matic possibility that returns to the self-production of life. ‘No other
path brings us to life except life itself’117. That is to say, there is no
other way of relating to the other, except through what the subject is
originally in itself: life. Accordingly, community and individuals are
not opposed to each other: they are living beings that live their ‘life’.
There is, thus, within life itself, a proliferation of living individuals
because life has an inner structure, which makes it be those living
individuals. Henry goes even further: life is a principium individu-
ationis and a totality of individuals. But, when proclaiming that ‘this
life is each time a living being’118, is not Henry refuting his main as-
sumption: namely the idea that immanence cannot be externalised,
divided, separated into different individualities?
116 Which even Fink felt obliged to criticise. Cf., for instance, Fink’s comments
(pp. 84-86) on Schutz’s essay ‘The problem of transcendental intersubjectiv-
ity in Husserl’ (Collected Papers III, The Hague, M.Nijhoff, 1966 , pp. 51-91),
where he declares that Husserl limited his analysis of the Other to that of
being present in a body, and ‘to this extent, not differing much from cats and
dogs’. Thus, Fink observes, ‘if having a body (Leib) should serve as a sufficient
indication of a transcendental fellow-subject, then one must, consequently,
conclude that cats and dogs are also transcendental subjects’ (p. 84). This is a
very good proof of the limits that Husserl’s account of the other unveils and
of the errors involved in considering the other from an ecstatic perspective.
However, this criticism, which we have mentioned in defence of Henry’s
position, can be simply refuted by pointing to the fact that the other is not
simply another living body, but one that bears resemblance to mine.
117 PM, p. 161.
118 PM, p. 170.
The ‘mystery’ of life, as Henry designates it, is that each living

being is co-extensive with life in its generality119. In this case, though,
how is a community possible, since the difference between individu-
als is never realised? These questions refer back to the possibility of a
phenomenology of the singular and to the difficulties characterising
Husserl’s discussion of a community of transcendental egos. If life
appears as monadic life, then Henry’s account is inconsistent with
the imperative of presenting a non-temporal, non-ecstatic and non-
divided essence. In this situation, singularity cannot go beyond the
limits of individuality. If, however, life is non-individualised, then
how is Henry to explain the possibility of the other as an alter sub-
jectivity. Moreover, if life is invisible, indifferent to the participation
into the appearing of the phenomenological approach, then what de-
fines an invisible individuation? The aporia that has been generated
from the beginning of our considerations into the non-ecstatic and
immanent singularity has to be related now to the relation between
Life and living beings. Is Henry’s phenomenology an account of the
singular? Or is it rather another relapse into particularity, as differ-
ence within identity?
Individuation vs. individuality

From Henry’s commentary on Husserl’s definition of imma-
nence, we have deduced that immanence is not to be interpreted as
individuation. A confirmation of this point of view is found in the
necessity to ‘exceed the concept of an individuated and empirical
being, and that of his environment and transcendental horizon,
in order to elevate ourselves to the concept of the original being
of subjectivity’120. What is significant in this quotation is the dis-
119 PM, p. 177.
120 PPC, p. 141.
tinction that Henry endeavours to make between individuation as

based on particularity, and individuality. While individuation pre-
supposes an empirical elucidation of the individual as belonging to
a spatial and temporal order, which Henry rejects as being an ec-
static deceit, individuality can only be conceived as sensibility and
inner production of life itself. Thus, far from founding individu-
ality on the fact of being an embodied individual, Henry strives
to impose equality between singularity and a more essential type
of individuality. Distinguishing singularity from individuation,
Henry points to the difference established between sensation and
sensing. Thus, an empirical being relates to sensations in order to
delimit his particular historical genesis. In contrast, sensing is just
a tonality of life that rejects inscription into temporal becoming.
Indeed, empirical beings are the products of a double objectifica-
tion: firstly, the objectified body is the result of an ecstatic relation
to the original, subjective body; secondly, the Archi-body of life,
which is the possibility of a subjective incarnation, is forced to op-
pose its essence and become transcendent121. This distinction be-
tween individuation and individuality can also be comprehended
through the relation between life and its empirical ‘incarnation’.
Similar to the appearing of Christ into the world, individuation
is another form of deceit because the mundane truth is a bring-
ing outside of itself, exhibition, and ecstatic visibility. The invisible
made visible or Christ taking the appearance of a human is, for
Henry, a ‘phenomenological aporia’122. World is, in this case, the
pre-horizon that dictates the rules of the appearance of empirical
beings. However, in the night of life, individuals are tonalities of
the self-affecting immanence and of an original singularity which is
not a synthesis of identification but rather the inappropriateness of
121 B, p. 143.
122 CV, p. 119.
distinction and separation. The self-experiencing life reveals itself

through tonalities and, in its radical immanence, never surpasses
itself. So, when Henry asserts that ‘original life is an individual
life’123, his observation has to unveil a more primordial form of
individuality, which coincides with the self-production of life. In
its diversity, which is non-temporal and not subjected to syntheses,
life is equal to itself; it is this equality itself124.
As we noted earlier on, Henry rejects individuation on the ba-
sis of an empirical belonging to the realm of the world. Thus, ‘the
Individuality of an Individual has nothing to do with that of a be-
ing, which in fact does not exist’125. More accurately, ‘the empirical
individual is not an Individual and cannot be one’126. Henry even
goes as far as to proclaim that an empirical being is an ‘optical il-
lusion’, due to the forgetfulness of life. Consequently, if the truth
of the world, which is a deceitful manifestation permits the process
of individuation of the living beings as differentiation by means of
objective bodies, the singular Life of the Christian phenomenology
suggests an immanent variation that is non-dissimulating, and self-
donating. Thus, the question of particularity and difference within
identity is specifically related to a transcendent thinking and is cre-
ated by the subordination of Life to the living being. In contradis-
tinction, Christianity announces the absence of division between
the two (‘no Life without a Living. No Living without Life’127),
and the primitive pre-birth of Life. As Henry notes, ‘the detrimen-
tal confusion of Life with (…) a living organism proceeds directly
from the phenomenological deficiency of the Western thought’128.
123 PPC, p. 147.
124 PPC, p. 274.
125 CV, p. 156.
126 CV, p. 157.
127 CV, p. 80.
128 CV, p. 62.
It is in opposition to this tendency that a phenomenology of life

has to be unveiled. According to it, ‘the living being comes to Life
by supporting itself on the coming of Life into its own self ’129.
The inner temporality of life

However, Henry’s identification of Life with individual life
is even more complex than what we have described so far. In a
paradoxical manner, Henry recognises that life can be ‘historia-
lised’, but in a non-temporal perspective. Acknowledging the inner
movement of life, he notices that this play of the Absolute with
itself is the real and veritable being of each of us; it is the specificity
[le propre] of each monad and is accomplished each time as one of
them, and this, insofar as, being the Absolute’s self-affection, life’s
subjectivity historialises [s’historialise] and essencifies [s’essencifie] it-
self each time as the Ipseity of an Individual130.
Once more Henry immediately clarifies that individuals are not
empirical beings, but living tonalities of life, since immanence does
not hold a face, or other plastic images. Furthermore, singularity
is an individual self-affection, embodied in our flesh: ‘this deter-
mined praxis, singular and individual, is our body’131. There is no
difference between an immanent, singular life and original indi-
viduality, i.e. the radical subjectivity that forms the most primitive
foundation of each living being. Life has an inner history and this
is what self-produces individuality as pathetic singularity132. To a
certain extent, life can be said to have an immanent temporality133,
without ever differing from itself. This historical temporality is pas-
129 CV, p. 73.
130 B, p. 69. Cf. also immanent temporality, CV, p. 201ff.
131 B, p. 80.
132 B, p. 123.
133 B, p. 141.
sive, and points to life’s self-enrichment and self-conservation. The

pathos of life opens it to a form of self-passivity that permits inner
generation to be compatible with the acceptance of singularity.
Temporality as the self-suffering of life has nothing in common
with Husserl’s absolute flow which is non-temporal in itself but ren-
ders possible temporality. The immanent temporality of auto-affec-
tion does not signify that life is the origin of its own movement, since
life never goes out of itself and cannot become part of an ecstatic
genesis. And ecstatic time means for Henry displaying subjectivity
out of itself, degeneration into nothingness, destruction and death
of that which it exhibits134. The structure of time is equally that of
the world where the appearing of an entity is also its disappearing,
in conformity with the transformation of reality into a mere image.
That is the reason why time cannot encompass anything present,
since it brings forth only an image of the present. The ecstatic struc-
ture of time is, in fact, nothing else but a modality of the imaginary
world. Returning to the invisible and indifference, time is described
by Henry as being indifferent to that which it exposes.
The immemorial memory of the ‘I can’: original resistance

To sum up, that which characterises the temporality of imma-
nence is its non-ecstatic dimension, as life does not have anything
in itself that can introduce separation, or distance. There is in life
no past nor future, no projection nor retrogression135, but only self-
temporal affecting, and the movement of pathos itself136. Operating
with the same difference, in Incarnation, Henry distinguishes an
ecstatic memory from an immemorial memory, arguing that life
134 Cf., for instance, CV, p. 29.
135 I, p. 206ff. Cf. also, M. Henry, ‘Phénoménologie de la naissance’ (Alter, 2, 1994,
pp. 295-312): ‘the living ego has neither past, nor future, nor present’ (p. 312).
136 B, p. 191.
is endowed with a non-representational and non-intentional type

of memory. This original memory is said to be immemorial and
consists in the ability of the flesh to exercise its powers in relation
to an original resistance. This corporeal memory is not habitual, in
the sense of a subjective genesis of repetitive capabilities, but pre-
cedes any actual form of ec-stasis. It is significant to mention that
the ability to act is, for Henry, not related to the world because it
is more original than the relations between spatial objects. Henry
finds the model of an organic, invisible and non-mundane body,
together with the idea of an original resistance that we encounter
prior to sensations, in the philosophy of Main de Biran. However,
when confronted to the necessity of giving a more precise defini-
tion of this ‘continuous resistance’, Henry picks out the example of
‘respiration’, which does not presuppose in any way ‘spatial limits’,
but only the practical resistance of our body137. With this choice
though, the original ‘I can’ returns to the imperative of transcen-
dence, because the act of respiration presupposes an outside, which,
even if not visibly spatial, is still non-immanent. Thus, despite
Henry’s efforts, intentionality seems to infiltrate into immanence.
But this solution is only temporarily accepted as Henry turns his
attention towards a more fundamental type of resistance.
However, before we analyse this original resistance, it is interest-
ing to note that the nature of the ‘I can’, which Henry attempts to
separate from transcendence, is constructed, to a certain extent, in
accordance with Husserl’s idea of a kinaesthetic subject. For Husserl,
the ego is not an empty abstractive pole, untouched by its activ-
ity, but a ‘historical’ subject characterised as essentially affected. The
ego is a monad, particularised by its habitualities, a becoming pole
in its transcendental history, concrete in the sense of a non-static,
non-abstractive subjectivity. Any constitution is ultimately rooted
in pre-constitutive elements. In this sense, the kinaesthetic subject
137 I, p. 214.
has both temporal and spatial horizons, which continually refer to

co-present profiles that can be unveiled in further perceptions, and
is, like in Henry’s phenomenology of life, an affected ego. Yet, in
opposition to Husserl, the original ‘I can’ of life is not transcendent
and does not presuppose perspectives. The immanent self is also gen-
erated through affection, but the passive affection is, in this case,
self-produced. Within this production, an inner distance is, though,
created: that between Life and a living being. The capability of life,
which is generated as a result of an original resistance, demands for a
more precise investigation of self-affection.
Aware of the contradictory notion of an original resistance,
Henry seems to appeal to a more subtle mechanism: the primal
resistance is not constituted in the presence of an intentional act,
but is rather generated by the weak self-affection of the ego. It is the
resistance against the absolute self-production of Life that defines
the life of an ego because ‘every power collides, in itself, with that
on which and against which it can nothing’138. The original resis-
tance is collision against a pre-original and absolute hyper-power.
The distance between the Self-affection of Life and the weak self-
affection of a living being is the key assumption on which Henry’s
phenomenology is constructed. Non-transcendent, the absolute
Life is identical to the immanence of a singular life.
The ipseity of a singular self / Self

Equating singularity and individuality by means of non-dif-
ferentiating tonalities is problematic. The explanation that Henry
offers in favour of singularity invokes a mysterious movement of
pathos, to which we have no access as to its appearing, and which
life never contradicts. Aware of the difficulties against which his
phenomenological explanation runs up, Henry introduces, in the
138 I, p. 248.
mechanism of his thought, a theological element that is, surpris-

ingly, identical to the foundation of a transcendental phenomenol-
ogy. More precisely, the pre-original generation of the Son by the
Father sustains the coincidence of Life to life, in the self-manifes-
tation that forms its basis. It is important to note the recurrence
of the idea of a pre-original affection, which accompanies the de-
velopment of a phenomenology of the singular. Thus, the Primal
Son is as primitive as the Father, and, in this sense, the bringing to
life of the Son is better described as Archi-birth. The pre-original,
the Immemorial, or the Absolute Before, is also captured by the
identification of Life with God, which, in the mystery of its self-
revelation, generates the Son and the condition of Sonship that
all living beings will embrace. Yet, despite its production with re-
gard to living individuals, life is singular: ‘it is a singular Self that
embraces itself, affects itself, experiences itself and enjoys itself ’139.
Stated in correlation to the generation of the First Born, ‘the ab-
solute Life experiences itself through an effective Ipseity, which is,
as such, an effective and, as a result, singular Self ’140. The idea of
self-enjoyment, which is also central to Levinas’s analysis of the
formation of the Self, indicates that Life is a monolith that discards
the obsession with difference and tautological identity.
Life and life: is man not God himself?

Between humans and God there is no separation with regard
to life. However, a certain irreversibility characterises the relation
of God to his sons, which distinguishes it from the con-substan-
tial co-belonging, ‘stronger that any conceivable unity’141, of the
Father and the Primal Son. This observation is very important for
139 CV, p. 76.
140 CV, p. 79.
141 CV, p. 88.
the elucidation of another aspect of the identity of the identity be-

tween Life and living humans. Namely, as Henry formulates it, ‘if
man bears in himself the essence of Life, is he not God himself or
Christ?’142. The issue raised by this question is fundamental to un-
derstanding the impossible differentiation of Life and the potential
division within immanence.
The demonstration of the non-identity of man and God is
rooted again in their identity as Life. Henry bridges the coherence
of its argument by postulating a paradoxical difference between a
weak and a strong sense of self-affection. The former applies itself
to humans and means that life is affected by itself, but is not that
which has generated this situation143. The latter, though, indicates
a strong self-affection: Life is affected by itself and it is this Life
that has produced the immanent context of its affection. Thus, the
life of living beings is not the source of its self-experiencing: ‘I am
not absolutely affecting myself, but, to state it rigorously, I am and
find myself self-affected’144. The distinction that Henry establishes
between a strong and a weak sense of self-affection makes possible
the elaboration of a phenomenological proof for the existence of
God in the Christian tradition. Thus, in Incarnation, Henry asks
the question about how to understand the affirmation that God
exists if nothing else is to be asserted about Him. The demon-
stration, which is constructed in line with medieval controversies
about God’s perfection, starts with the biblical statement that God
is Life. Or, says Henry, ‘Life is not a simple concept, it is posited as
an absolute existence if one living lives, if I live’145. In other words,
because I discover myself as living, God has to exist. The argument
follows the idea of self-affection and asserts that ‘because I, who
142 CV, p. 132.
143 CV, p. 136.
144 CV, p. 136.
145 I, p. 245.
lives, have not generated myself as life (…) then this living, this
Self, this flesh do not come, in fact, to themselves except through
the process by which absolute Life comes to itself in its Verb’146.
The self-affection of the living beings, which is an internal expe-
rience, constitutes the phenomenological demonstration of Life’s
self-production and existence.
Birth vs. creation

Another interesting dimension that Henry brings into his
phenomenology of singularity is the dismissal of the idea of cre-
ation. Thus, while for Levinas, the creation ex nihilo constitutes the
precise image of a creature that ignores its creator, for Henry the
creation-model is not satisfactory. The difference draws on their
inspirational texts: for Levinas, the Old Testament and Judaism;
for Henry, the New Testament and Christianity. Delimiting man
as ens creatum presupposes that humans are of the same substance
as the world – exterior to the divine essence of life. However, the
novelty of the phenomenology of Christ is that it imposes humans
as sons of God, rather than as beings in the world. Christianity is,
hence, the only phenomenological approach that extends to hu-
mans the condition of Sonship and singularises them through life.
Nevertheless, the birth of humans, not in line with a mundane
genealogy, which is built upon the idea of succession in time and
empirical individuation, but as sons of God, is paradoxical in itself.
To quote Henry, Christian birth is a ‘paradoxical extension to the
human being of the extraordinary condition of the Archi-son, born
before the world and before the times’147. Thus, creation and birth
are separated by a gap, similar to the way in which an image is dif-
146 I, p. 245.
147 CV, p. 125.
ferent from its original. Only life, grasped as self-generation and

birth, can produce a singular Self, since man created in the image
of God is nothing else but duplication and dissimulation. Similarly
dangerous for a phenomenology of life is the duplication that is
often associated to the double nature of Christ. For Henry, this
duality has to be rejected as it is founded on the mistaken idea that
there was a human nature constituted before Christ. Consequently,
it is necessary to conceive Christ not in the image of humans, but,
vice versa, to see in man its Sonship condition.
Singular in itself, life is self-produced, and self-born. Henry
constantly underlines this aspect, reinforcing, throughout his ac-
count, the singular nature of the Self of life. To illustrate, ‘I am
myself this singular Self generated, produced in the self-production
of the absolute Life’148. Or, ‘the singular Self that I am experiences
itself only within the movement through which Life throws itself
into itself ’149. The image of a singular Self is, therefore, an un-
doubted postulate, which is applied to characterise both Life, as
absolute immanence, and life, in its individual tonality. However,
there is even greater complexity to Henry’s account as he embraces,
like Levinas, the idea of multiple singularities.
Multiple singularities
The multiplication of singularities is a remarkable step in Henry’s
phenomenological examination of immanence. The inauguration
of multiple singularities refers to the condition of the sons of the
Archi-Son, or Christ. The First Living, in its co-belonging to the
Father, is also the ‘living flesh’ and ‘the transcendental condition
148 CV, p. 132.
149 CV, p. 136.
of every possible “myself ”’150. The transcendental birth of a self,

which renders possible the understanding of the plural in the con-
dition of sons of God, is generated through Christ. Thus, Christ
is not, at first, a medium between God and man, but rather a me-
dium between each self and his own self, between me and myself as
a self. This relation in Christ, far from being abstract, is rooted in
the flesh of life. Moreover, the living flesh has to be differentiated
from Merleau-Ponty’s account of the flesh insofar as, though con-
dition of a relation, it remains within immanence, not like a form
of unification through difference, but rather like an inner multi-
plication of life, which is never divided in itself. However, the role
of Christ is, to some extent, similar to the one that the other plays
in the Levinasian Other-in-the-Same: the subject singularises itself
and becomes a self through the Archi-son. Furthermore, it is again
the possibility of a multiplicity of singulars that distinguishes Life,
as Archi-flesh, from the anonymous flesh151 that Merleau-Ponty
exposes in his ontology. Indeed, the flesh of the immanence is nec-
essarily bound to an individual life, but not in a way that imposes
separation and fracture within Life. The particular temporal, spa-
tial and causal relations of an empirical subject to the world (his
mundane body) are secondary and irrelevant in the determination
of flesh. It is, once more, the complex rapport between the Archi-
flesh and the flesh that explains the possibility of singularities. To
reach the ultimate singularity, a reduction of the ‘naïve compre-
hension of life, identified to a particular being, empowered with
particular properties (motility, nutrition, reproduction, etc.)’152,
has to be performed. Following this reduction, life is unveiled as
phenomenality and not as a particular being, or an entity.
150 CV, 143.
151 I, 178.
152 I, 180.
The flesh is, for Henry, pre-original, in the same sense in which
Levinas considers the Saying to signify otherwise than from within
the dependence of the creature on the creator. In other words, an
ignorant self, created ex nihilo, echoes the same preoccupation for
the flesh that does not constitute, nor is constituted. Accordingly,
Henry can conclude that ‘there is thus a “Prior-to-ego” that inter-
dicts to the latter to posit himself as an ultimate foundation, an
ultimate naturant’153, or an absolute, constitutive ego. Prior to this
ego, there is an original Ipseity where Life self-produces life. Let us
now deepen the relation that Henry establishes between Life and
the Individual, or between the Archi-flesh and the flesh, which will
introduce the idea of a multiplicity of singularities.
As noted previously, individuality is linked to life in a way which
has nothing in common with the usual meaning of this notion, which
normally presupposes the existence of two separated terms 154. This
relation is equally foreign to the dialectical relation between con-
traries that recall each other in synthesis. By contrast, ‘the relation
between Individual and Life is, in Christianity, a relation that takes
place within Life and proceeds from it, being nothing else but its
specific movement’155. Radically altered in their common mean-
ing, “life” and “individual” signify within the phenomenology of
Christ an original co-immanence. Life is, hence, not an abstract
and global principle, opposed to individuals, but is precisely the
identity between them as life. It is on the basis of this understand-
ing that Henry can now claim that there is a difference between
Individuals, which is not generated by what or how they feel, but is
produced by the fact that they feel their affection themselves156. As
a result, there is a multiplicity of non-similar Individuals, which, in
153 I, p. 243.
154 CV, p. 150.
155 CV, p. 151.
156 CV, p. 164.
contrast to the empirical individuation that still presents a certain

communality between beings, presupposes the idea of their singu-
larity. These ‘irreducible, singular Individuals’157, in their enigmatic
difference, which Henry does not elucidate as to its phenomeno-
logical justification158, are themselves life, and transcendental sons.
Unique, they are yet the same: life in self-production and self-af-
fection. Against Husserl’s analysis of the relation with the other,
Henry prefers to envisage a Mit-sein rapport159 that is produced not
from the point of view of a self, but from within the absolute Life in
which they subsist as distinct singularities.
157 CV, p. 165.
158 For a critical reading of Henry’s phenomenology of Christianity, cf. R.
Bernet’s insightful study ‘Christianity and philosophy’ (Continental Phi-
losophy Review, 32/3, 1999, pp. 325-42). For a Husserlian reading of I am
the Truth, cf. J. Hart, ‘Michel Henry’s Phenomenological Theology of Life’,
(Continental Philosophy Review, 32/3, 1999, pp. 183-230).
159 I, p. 347. S. Laoureux, art.cit., emphasises the fact that the question of the
other provokes a positive evolution in Henry’s work towards a more vacillat-
ing form of immanence. He considers that the richness that Henry discovers
in the experience of the other cannot offer remarkable changes because of the
conceptual framework that he employs, i.e. ‘an aporetic tautology’ (p. 168).
If it is true that Henry’s work is open to different interpretations, I think
that Laoureux’s reading overstates the importance of the ‘pathos-avec’ that
Henry exposes throughout his texts, and overlooks the originality and radi-
cal nature of the latter’s phenomenology. The same goes for Y. Yamagata’s
endeavour to read Henry’s phenomenology as being rooted in a form of
affectivity that is distinctive from pure subjectivity. In Yamagata’s opinion,
there is a primal form of alterity that immanence comprises and, thus, the
identification of immanence with subjectivity is misleading. According to
his reading (‘Une autre lecture de l’Essence de la manifestation: immenence,
présent vivant et altérité, Les Études philosophiques, 2, 1991, pp. 173-191), it
is through affectivity that the distinction between a subject and an object is
formed. However, though this appropriation of Henry’s phenomenology is
significantly original, I believe that separating immanence from subjectivity
is contrary to textual evidence and to its author’s intentions.
4. The giving of a singular life

Our study of Henry’s notion of singularity will conclude with a
more general perspective upon the type of phenomenology that the
singular demands. After having explored Henry’s polemic reading
of Husserl’s project, and attempted to understand what demarcates
life as singularity, we will prepare, in this section, the ground for
the final remarks of this study by drawing on the distinction be-
tween the given, the giving and the gift. The articulation of this
distinction will enable us to grasp the novelty of Henry’s account
and, also, the manner in which a phenomenological approach is
capable of exposing the singular.
Singularity: the gift of life

Let us begin by asking the following question: how can Henry
maintain singularity in the form of a living being if the possibility of
its subsistence resides in a pre-original Life? This original distance,
which is the foundation of the explanation of inner temporality, of
the relation with the other, and of the self-affected kinaesthetic life,
has to be investigated more attentively. Indeed, to quote Henry, is
not this pre-constitution a questioning of every ‘singular reality’,
which has been refused the capacity to subsist in itself, but only
through another160? How can Henry argue that Life is identical to
every singular individual, whilst it differs in its tonalities? In order
to address these paradoxes, we need to scrutinise the specificity of
the gift that Life offers to every living being.
The difference between the strong self-affection of Life and the
weak self-production of a singular individual is accurately seized
through the notion of gift. At the same time, the departure that
160 I, p. 255.
Henry’s phenomenology of life makes with regard to the imperative

of givenness is to be envisaged in the evaluation of the phenomeno-
logical status of the gift. Is there a difference between pre-givenness
and the idea of a gift? This question marks the fundamental issue
of what particularises a phenomenology of life.
In the common understanding of a gift, a separation is pro-
duced between the one that offers the gift, the gift itself, and its
receiver. However, this exterior dependence is not produced in the
situation of a phenomenology of the gift of life. In the light of
this original perspective, the separating poles of the giving relation
are entirely changed. Self-given, the gift is precisely the distance
between Life as self-generation and the life of an immanent liv-
ing being that knows itself as receiver. It is the special status of the
gift that unveils the inner possibility of a phenomenology of life,
insofar as the self-donation of Life is the given on which phenom-
enality is built. Against the idea of transmutable gifts, which effect
a change in appearance and in the ‘tag’ relating the present to an
unique donor, Henry endeavours to point to a gift ‘that is nothing
of which [life] can separate itself ’161.
Deceitful gifts
The gap between transcendent gifts and the absolute gift of life
is double. The former ones are deceitful gifts: they can be re-donat-
ed because the bound between the one that offers the gift and the
gift is only contingent. Furthermore, the gift does not singularise
its receiver, since someone else can equally be entitled to receive
the gift. It is this double indifference that defines ecstatic gifts. To
illustrate, let us recall Henry’s description of a what defines a tran-
scendent language162: ‘the lie is not a possibility of language in ad-
161 I, p. 252
162 Both Henry and Marion consider language in its hermeneutical relation to
dition to another one, which would oppose itself to it – telling the

truth, for instance’. On the contrary, language is by itself a lie163.
The difference of language to the thing it expresses is indifference,
because the word can be applied to different things. That is to say,
the gift can be re-offered without any trace of its previous collec-
tor. Besides, several terms can be applied to describe a thing, and,
hence, the gift becomes multiple in relation to its receiver. The
donor is also non-unique: that is the meaning of communication
as possibility of exchange. For Derrida164, the mechanism of gift-
counter-gift is precisely the reason for the aporetic nature of the
gift. The impossibility of exchange must condition the definition
of the gift. Chancy, and irruptive, the gift has to ignore itself as a
gift, and the donation has to happen as if in spite of itself. The gift
embodies in itself the forgetfulness of its condition. Contrary to
the generality that exchange introduces, the singular, as Deleuze
observes, has to be connected to gift and theft, i.e. to the ‘non-
exchangeable and non-substitutable’165.
the biblical revelation of Christ as Son of God. Beginning his exposition
on the phenomenology of life and Christianity, Henry devotes important
parts of his book C’est moi la vérité to an analysis of the textual interpreta-
tion of this revelation. In God Without Being, Marion also discusses the
status of the incarnation in its relation to the Word that founds the human
logos. Thus, Henry’s unfolding of the pathos of the Saying bears striking
similarities to the eucharistic hermeneutics that Marion suggests. For both,
the biblical exegesis has to be guided by the event of incarnation, when the
Word transgresses the text towards God. To quote Marion, ‘the Eucharist
offers the only correct hermeneutic site where the Word can be said in
person’ (p. 153). As a result, a delay of the human language with regard to
the Word of God, or the Saying of Life is produced. As for Levinas, the
human said has to be guided by an unspeakable Word. For all of them, the
language can say an ‘otherwise’ than what it says.
163 CV, p. 16.
164 Derrida, GT.
165 Deleuze, DR, p. 1.
Henry maintains the inability of exchange in his definition of

the veritable gift of life. The connection between phenomenology
and language serves again as a means of exemplifying the difference
between counterfeit gifts and the gift of life. Against the indiffer-
ence that characterises the rapport of the word to its referent, which
inaugurates universality, Henry brings forth the immanence of life.
The language of ec-stasis ‘does not contain within itself the reality
of which it speaks’166. This ‘ontological insufficiency’ of language
is replaced, in the context of a real gift, by the bind that unites the
donor to the gift. Otherwise stated, immanence is to define life as
a gift of itself, or as self-giving. To quote Henry, ‘inscribed in the
donation, given to itself in the self-donation of the absolute life,
(…) the gift of life, which internally edifies in it [life], subsists only
through it [life]’167.
The gift: possession and dispossession

In Marion’s God without being the gift is presented in relation to
the parable of the prodigal son to suggest a significant distinction
between a veritable gift and the possession that dispossesses itself.
The interpretation of the biblical text allows Marion to explore the
ineluctable relation between the gift, and the one that gives it. As
previously underlined, for Henry the gift is a paternal concession
of the condition of filiation. To delimit the specificity of the gift,
Marion employs the same image: the prodigal son, by dispossessing
his father and annulling his filiation, transforms the gift into a pos-
session. In other words, ‘from gift received, ousia becomes property
appropriated without the gift- abandoned by the gift, because first
166 Henry, ‘Material phenomenology and language’, p. 349.
167 I, p. 252.
abandoning the gift’168. As it is the case for the affection that the gift
of life presupposes in Henry’s phenomenology, the gift of filiation is
dissipated when transposed from its condition as a gift, into a mere
possession of the receiver. The parable is yet more complex: the son
who returns from his abandonment of the paternal gift is forgiven.
That is to say, the gift is returned to its condition; it is re-given to
the son. But, while Henry and Derrida reject the idea of exchange,
for Marion the possibility of circulation is the one that differentiates
possession from gift. The giving is more important than that which
is given: the idol, or the gift arrested against its circulation, is differ-
ent from the icon. Thus, the play of donation is the only one that,
against the idea of possession, is capable of alluding to the ontologi-
cal difference between Being and beings.
The distinction that Marion constructs between the gift and
the possession of goods allows a better grasp of what is at stake
in Henry’s phenomenology of life. In fact, despite apparent dis-
crepancies on the potentiality of circulation169, Marion and Henry
converge on one significant point. Namely, the gift does not op-
erate a radical difference between Life and life, which would be
equivalent to re-installing the supremacy of the ontological differ-
ence. Captured in the image of the gift, the absolute Life of radi-
cal immanence, and the life of singular individuals do not oppose
each other, nor do they tautologically coincide. The gift precedes
the distance between the two and renders possible the idea of an
169 The circulation that Marion envisages in the differentiation of the gift from
possessions is not identical to the gift-countergift mechanism that Henry
and Derrida oppose. For Marion, exchange is rather to be understood as
an impossibility to freeze the donation and to transform it into a property
that can be possessed only by fixing it into an idol, i.e. a measure of my
own self. This is a point on which both Henry and Derrida would agree:
the countergift is a return that destroys the value of the gift.
absolute immanence. Before we deepen the original dimension

that a phenomenology based on the gift introduces in relation to
intentional phenomenology, let us reconsider the impossibility of
a countergift.
The ethical ‘counter-gift’

As we noted earlier on, in Henry’s phenomenology, the gift of
life does not tolerate exchange: between God and humans no revers-
ibility is to be accepted. In Levinas’s notion of election, the other
cannot be subjected to a counter-election: it is only the same that
can be elected as responsible, without appeal and any possibility to
pass on this responsibility, or decline the election. This implies that
the chosen one cannot be replaced, or become a chooser170. The elec-
tion, similar to the gift, is not exchangeable or transmutable. The
idea of an asymmetrical relation between the donor and the receiver
appears to be the inner condition of the gift. That is to say, the gift,
as Derrida notes, cannot be turned into a countergift. Life can be
self-generated, in a strong sense of self-affection, and become gift
that God offers to living individuals. The gift is a donation of its
own Self: ‘it is not a pseudo-donation, the donation of a pretending
Self ’171. On the contrary, Life self-gives itself through the gift of life.
That is the reason why the gift is real: it has not been created from
something external to its donor, through pure forgery. The gift can-
not exist separated from the one who offers it and does not consti-
tute anything alien to its donor. The original donation of life, which
forms the pivot of Henry’s phenomenology, is such that, given to an
individual, it becomes its own life. The gift, by being received, gives
birth to its receiver and continues to be self-donation.
170 OBBE, 56.
171 I, 263.
Similar to Derrida, Henry considers forgetfulness to be a consti-

tutive part of the gift. But the impossibility that Derrida underlines
in the situation of a gift that alludes to memory is, for Henry, the
very positive condition of life. Returning to the presupposition that
life has no memory and no distance that would permit the possibil-
ity of remembrance, we can say that ‘Life bathes [baigne] in a radical
Forgetfulness, due to its own essence’172. But there is an immemorial
memory that sustains the gift as a gift, and the self-generation of Life
as life. In this sense, life escapes memory because memory never sep-
arates itself from life. This ‘memory without memory’ is the ‘silence
of the organs’173, which is our own flesh. So, the gift of life cannot
be forgotten because it is itself revealed only through forgetfulness.
Immanence is the possibility of self-embrace and the impossibility of
separation. The play between the gift and the necessary forgetfulness
that renders it possible represents a significant point in the phenom-
enology of life. Its consequences are related to the idea that the gift,
by forgetting itself as a gift, also forgets its donor and ceases to exist
as such. In this mechanism, Henry captures the ethical substance of
the gift. In Marion’s commentary on the biblical parable, the prodi-
gal son leaves for a ‘great region’, to live his life as a ‘libertine’174. For
both Henry and Marion, the sinful son is the one who forgets the
gift of its sonship, i.e. the paternal gift of filiation.
Similar to the gift of responsibility in Levinas’s philosophy, the
gift of life has an ethical meaning that marks its existence as a gift.
Life is, as we have previously noted, an original ‘I can’ that delimits
life as self-affection. But, the donated life can turn against its status
and suspend its condition as a gift. In this situation, the humans
take themselves to be origins, the creators of their own life. This
new modality of forgetfulness installs dissimulation and appear-
172 I, 267.
173 I, p. 267.
174 GB, p. 96.
ance. In separating the gift from its donor, the receiver destroys
its condition. In order to retrieve its initial condition, an ethical
intrigue has to be introduced in the substance of the gift. Far from
being gratuitous, as Derrida would accentuate, the gift asks for rec-
ognition. Levinas associates the image of a trauma to his notion of
the gift of responsibility. The debt that the gift initiates increases
with responsibility: I am obliged to the point of substitution, I
am a hostage without defence, responsible without assuming this
election. The gift of responsibility demands that the same delivers
himself, not as a countergift, but as a remorseful subject. In corre-
lation to the trauma of ethical election, Henry introduces anguish
in the inner essence of the gift. Contrasted to the innocence which
does not know itself to be innocent because there is no distance in
the moment of self-confirmation, the condition of the receiver is
such that anguish is always inherent to its existence. Indeed, the
gift has to be remembered as a gift, and the anguish of this obliga-
tion is present prior to any decision. The innocence has been lost
in paradise, and the transcendental Self can only be anguishing: ‘as
innocent as innocence could be, a secret anguish inhabits it’175.
The model for Henry’s phenomenology is Christian ethics, which,
in contrast to the Law of the Old Testament, focuses on sustaining
life above the norm.: ‘The new Law is not anymore an ideal norm,
an empty noema, it is the essence that defines reality, Life’176. The
idea of predestination is central to the ethics of life as it points to the
obligation that the self-affected life has in relation to Life, without
the possibility of annulling this debt. The gift is, therefore, one that
obligates its receiver. In relation to absolute Life, the singular im-
manence of an individual is powerless insofar as its self-production is
a gift of life. The ethical acknowledgement of the gift is not guided
175 I, p. 275.
176 CV, p. 232.
by any teleological direction because life is good in itself. As was the

case with the malignant existence in Levinas’s writings, the decision
to consider life as good in itself is a pre-decision.
The giving: with, or without its giver

The gift is the distance created between the Archi-life of God
and the life of the transcendental self of the living being. At the
same time, the gift, in its non-retrievable donation, identifies itself
with the donor and with the one who receives it. For Henry, the
idea of creation is, therefore, inadequate to describe life, because
the image of self-donation implies that no dissimulation has dis-
rupted the identity between the donor and the gift itself. If we
turn to Levinas’s notion of election, the image of creation can be
accepted only on the basis of the nothingness out of which the
being has been created. In this sense, the genesis is the moment of
rupture of the constitutive ego. The image of the gift, whether it
is a gift of life, or a gift of responsibility places the constitutive self
of the phenomenological inquiry at the margins of its capability.
The gift is, therefore, the pre-given that cannot be taken posses-
sion of, the donation that has to be understood, but not arrested,
at the moment when the gift passes from the donor to the receiver.
In Marion’s words, the gift is liberated from the ontological differ-
ence only ‘in the name of that which, greater than it, comes behind
it’177. It is precisely this moment of passage, when the gift is not
an extension of the donor, neither a possession of the enjoying self,
177 GB, p. 102. In this sense, D. Janicaud (‘Articulations/Désarticulations’, Phé-
noménologie et herméneutique II, Lausanne, Eds. Payot Lausanne, 2001, pp.
9-19) was right to suggest that Marion’s translation of Gegebenheit as ‘dona-
tion’ rather that as ‘donné’ had a hidden meaning behind it. To quote him,
‘en français, toute donation implique un donateur et un donataire’ (p. 16).
which Levinas and Henry attempt to give. That is the reason why
the gift is never an object of ownership, but it demands to be sus-
pended in an ethical obligation to confess its donor. The ambigu-
ity of language, which concedes the condition of the ‘in-between’
of the gift, and the defeat of a unidirectional flow of temporality,
which is always drawn back to the immemorial origin of the dona-
tion, give the conditions of possibility of a gift.
To illustrate, in greater detail, the turn that the phenomenologists
of singularity effect with regard to their predecessors, let us make
use of Marion’s distinction between two different ways in which one
can approach the notion of a gift. In the first understanding of the
gift, Marion starts with the giving itself. In privileging the giving,
the giver is suspended: ‘we therefore must leave the giver in suspen-
sion’178. The similarity with the phenomenological reduction is not
accidental because what the first sense of the gift suggests is that we
only have to focus on the giving. In ‘there is’, or ‘il y a’, the giving
masks the giver: we must suspend ‘even the very idea that a giver is
necessary to the it gives’179. However, there is a second understanding
of the gift that regards the giving as it is related to the giver. In other
words, if the first sense of the gift is traditionally phenomenologi-
cal, strictly reducing the gift to the giving, the second sense captures
the movement inherent in a phenomenology of singularity. That is,
the giving must open a radical understanding of the giver: the pre-
original. Marion states it very clearly: the giver is not an origin in the
sense that, were we to rebind the origin with that which it originates,
we ‘would miss precisely the whole stake of the gift, by a gross ontic
and even causal regression’180. Between the giver and the gift, a more
178 GB, p. 103.
179 Ibid.
180 Ibid. Cf. also p. 105 where the giver in the giving is distinguished from the
‘creator’, which would impose a deeper sense of appropriation by means of
the act of creation.
‘original’ distance is produced, which for Henry defines the more

profound meaning of immanence.The gift is the one which sends us
back to the giver: ‘it unites only to the extent that it distinguishes’181.
For Henry and Levinas, the sending back, far from initiating a coun-
tergift circulation, is the movement that founds ethics.
Phenomenology and Christianity

Self-revealing Life, described as divine self-manifestation, brings
a theological theme within Henry’s phenomenology. In spite of the
suggestion that we find in an earlier work that even the Absoluteness
of God receives its effective nature by being situated within life182,
Henry’s truth of life appears, in his later text, to draw its phenom-
enality from God’s self-production or self-revelation. Christianity’s
teaching begins to prevail in the elaboration of a phenomenology
of life. The singularity of immanence is sustained through the self-
revelation of the Father in the archi-generation of the First Living.
That is to say, Henry’s phenomenology of the singular has to use
a theological motif- the Christian mystery regarding the identity
beyond totality of the Father and of the Son, to preserve its access
to a singularity beyond particularity. Remarkably, it is the divine
condition of Sonship that determines the escape from particular-
ity, allowing Henry to maintain an enigmatic, first-person account
of life. The self-revealing of Life bears similarity to a phenomeno-
logical reduction: the truth of the world has to be bracketed in or-
der to unveil the self-manifestation of God, or Life. Moreover, the
empirical individual has to be subjected to annulment so that the
original, or rather pre-original life can reveal itself as self-affection.
Henry radically transforms phenomenology, to the extent that its
181 GB, p. 104.
182 PM, p. 127.
movement under the heading of faith seems to situate it to the

limits of its own condition. However, employing Marion’s distinc-
tion between a mere giving, and the gift as a giving that exposes its
giver, one can embrace, to a greater extent, the originality of both
Levinas and Henry. On the theological turn in the phenomenology
of singularity, it is important to note that religion, in the sense of
re-linking (religio), is a more adequate description of the status of
the gift. Between a philosophical understanding which accentuates
the independence of the receiver, and the silence of a donor that
does not offer anything, in the absence of every potential receiver,
the gift is the one that re-binds the donor and the collector at the
moment of the donation. The gift in its giving has not bridged the
distance in the act of donation: that is to say, the pre-given has not
yet been given. It is this aspect that both Levinas and Henry mo-
bilise against Husserl in an attempt to change the perspective from
which phenomenality can be conceived. To sum up, we can say that
a phenomenology of the singular is based on the notion of the gift,
rather than on pure giving. This means that the donor singularises
and constitutes, through the gift, its recipient. While in Husserl’s
phenomenology, the receiver is intentionally oriented towards that
which is given, and is identical, therefore, to the donor, in the phe-
nomenology of the singular the giving is non-intentional, rooted in
passivity. That is the reason why the giving can only be a gift, offered
to openness, vulnerability, receptivity, and non-freedom.
Conclusion
The progress of the study
We began our reflections on the possibility of a phenomenology

of the singular by stressing the fundamental incompleteness of the
phenomenological reduction as it is elaborated in Husserl’s texts.
The descriptive imperative of Husserl’s formative phenomenology

proved to always be accompanied by a prescriptive view, making,
thus, necessary the acceptance of a non-intuitive datum within a
phenomenological research back to the things themselves. The na-
ture of this ‘operative shadow’, as Fink defines it, which phenom-
enology is not able to grasp in a direct apprehension, refers to the
origin of our phenomenological givenness, and to the original as an
imperative to complete givenness. Against the background of these
operative ‘holes’ that phenomenology leaves uncovered, we com-
menced our research by analysing Husserl’s potential contribution
to the phenomenology of the singular, which we examined following
three lines of inquiry. Firstly, we scrutinised the simplest and non-
divided elements, which offer the basis of all complex sense-forma-
tions. These non-compounded singulars are sensuous data that form
the lowest constitutive strata. The first chapter of the book provided
a discussion of the issues related to the singularity of the sense-data.
The main point was that the hyletic elements could not be consid-
ered as being pure presenting contents, animated by apprehensions.
The insufficiency of this schema, altered by Husserl in his work on
time-consciousness, propels one to envisage hyle as presenting an
internal intentional aspect. However, between pure presence and in-
ner difference, hyle cannot satisfy the need for absolute singularity,
because it can never be only one, or the other of these two alterna-
tives. If non-synthetic and immediate, the sense-data provoke serious
problems in the phenomenological model of constitution. Likewise,
if one adopts an intentional openness within the hyletic data, one
loses the immediate characteristic of the singular, and renders it syn-
thetic. The result of this analysis infers that Husserl’s treatment of the
sense-data is contradictory due to the fact that it cannot radicalise a
return to the original stratum of a phenomenological constitution.
The second attempt to offer an account on singularity was di-
rected to manifold-unitary singulars, or to singularity as particular-
ity. In accordance with our analyses on individuality, we deduced

that Husserl’s phenomenology allows for a weaker sense of singular-
ity (principium singularitatis as equivalent to principium individuatio-
nis), understood in conformity with individual entities. Starting with
a clarification of the question of individuation in Husserl’s work, we
subsequently turned to the structure of generic individuation, sug-
gesting that a sense of repetition was embodied in the functioning
of the transcendental constitutive ego. The same synthetic dimen-
sion was, in the subsequent subchapter, unveiled in the process of
thing-constitution. Objects were defined as synthetic unities, which
refuted the possibility of a singular appearing. The term particularity
was, hence, deployed to stand for a synthetic form of phenomena.
Again, Husserl could not endorse a non-comparative perspective on
phenomenological constitution, but illustrated the compulsory in-
vestigation of a non-singular ‘in-between’.
The third chapter of the inquiry into Husserl’s study of singular-
ity looked at the ultimate structures of constitution. The path that
we followed in this section was that of unique phenomena, as the
ones which elude syntheses because of their foundational role in a
phenomenological research. The course of our thinking guided us
towards a close analysis of the time-constituting consciousness, and
of world-constitution. However, this investigation compelled us to
slide off the phenomenal realm and to enter into the ‘shadowy’ area
of the pre-phenomenal. The absolute flow cannot be directly appre-
hended, but it rather functions as an assumption as far as the con-
stitutive acts are concerned. The phenomenological research is thus
unable to solve the aporia of the origin. Likewise, the efforts made to
unveil the ultimate experience involved in world-constitution expose
us to a sense of pre-givenness and pre-phenomenal spatiality.
The results of our observations concerning the singular in
Husserl’s thinking indicated that singularity has a rather precarious
status within descriptive phenomenology, and is narrowly accepted
to signify particularity. We also noted that the singular tends to

have a presumptive characteristic within phenomenology and ap-
pears at the limits of constitution, related to the question of origin.
It also became apparent that when an original givenness was in-
volved, as it was the case with investigations related to self-consti-
tution and to thing-constitution, the singular had to be integrated
into a stream of genetic reflections that failed to complete a radical
reduction to an absolutely primitive foundation. Thus, it is clear
that an intuitive insight into the singular cannot be achieved on the
assumptions that orient Husserl’s phenomenological project.
Undermining the possibility of a phenomenological account of
the singular, Husserl’s phenomenology makes us doubt the adequa-
cy of our task. However, in the second part of our study, two ma-
jor introductions to a phenomenology of singularity revealed the
centrality of such an explanative assignment, deriving their primal
inspirational force from Husserl’s texts. Seen in this perspective,
the philosophical elaboration of a phenomenology of the singular
seems to continue and radicalise Husserl’s treatment of singularity,
orienting itself towards the operative ‘holes’ that we evoked earlier
on. More precisely, a phenomenology of the singular reverses the
unsatisfactory focus that singularity received in Husserl’s work in
order to posit a more fundamental approach to phenomena. The
major criticism that is constructed in relation to Husserl’s writings
stresses the derivative and secondary nature of syntheses. That is to
say, we gained access to a phenomenology of singularity by reduc-
ing the legitimacy of the synthetic thought.
In more detail, Levinas’s philosophy departs from the synthetic
grasp that influenced Husserl’s phenomenological account, unveil-
ing a singularity that is situated beyond difference and identification.
Turning towards a theory of being in his interpretation of Husserl’s
oeuvre, Levinas directs, in a first instance, his research towards factu-
ality. The hypostatic self represents a first attempt to give expression
to singularity.In a subsequent insight into the defection of totality,

Levinas extends his economical definition of singularity to describe
a more original meaning of the term. Indeed, the other represents
the non-synthetic expression of a phenomenological givenness, and
is the one that singularises the economic self. It is, hence, remark-
able that Levinas’s texts do not only institute a possible account of
singularity, but that they also engender a vision of multiple singu-
larities. However, in a continuous effort to disengage his research
from the intermediary status of a phenomenological grasp, Levinas
imposes a special interest into an ‘otherwise’ than being, into a pre-
original and diachronic givenness, and into a Saying that suspends
the definitive nature of every said.
After advancing systematically into the specificity of one phe-
nomenology of the singular, we provided, in the final part of the
book, another phenomenological insight into the question of sin-
gularity. Indeed, Henry’s phenomenology of life confirms the intu-
itions brought forth by Levinas’s account. Firstly, the radical position
with regard to Husserl’s phenomenology implies a more restrictive
definition of the phenomenal, which, when applied to the ques-
tion of singularity, suggests that the singular is not to be confused
with subjective particularities. After elaborating on the distance that
Henry takes in relation to Husserl’s phenomenology, we elucidated
the characteristics that contribute to the consideration of life as sin-
gularity. With these suggestive, rather than conclusive distinctions
in mind, we subsequently directed our attention to the manner in
which life escapes external, as well as internal, syntheses. Thus, in the
second subsection of our sixth chapter, we addressed the problem
of wider synthetic grasps, showing that life, as singularity, cannot
tolerate dualism. Focusing on a comparison with Merleau-Ponty’s
non-dualistic relation between the visible and the invisible, we at-
tempted to stake out the complexity of a non-synthetic singular.
Supplementing this discussion, in the third subchapter, we analy-

sed the non-synthetic internal structure of life. These investigations
proved that life is, indeed, a singular givenness and that a phenom-
enological approach to this immanent form of subjectivity is made
possible by Henry’s philosophy. Moreover, we introduced a further
distinction with the notion of gift in order to capture, conclusively,
the move operated by a phenomenology of singularity.
Results
In the changes imposed by a phenomenology of the singular,
several aspects have to be underlined. As we stated in our intro-
ductory part, the fact that Levinas’s work on the singular bears an
opposing appearance in relation to Henry’s phenomenology helped
us to perform, in an indirect way, a reductive movement of their in-
ner assumptions. Accordingly, based on their central results, we can
now formulate the theses that are to be taken into consideration
with regard to a phenomenology of the singular.
1. The experience of the singular is immediate and does not
presuppose representational thought. In this sense, both
Levinas and Henry introduce a more reductive seizure of the
non-representational basis of phenomenology. As a result, the
duplication inserted by a reflective thinking is to be refuted.
2. Related to the previous point, the givenness of the singular is
rooted in a primitive, affective receptivity and in a complete
layer of passivity. This means that a phenomenology of
singularity has to cast away the activity and spontaneity of a
free ego. To this observation, we can add the image of suffering
that appears as fundamental in a phenomenological project
on singularity.
3. From the idea of a passive affection derives an aspect of
normative constitution that both Levinas and Henry evoke.

The importance of ethics in the experience of the singular
is, therefore, to be clearly stressed. It is also significant that
the singular can be described as a gift that we are not free to
decline. Hence, the importance of being elected or subjected
(sub-jectum) to pre-destination. Nonetheless, the ethical
orientation, though starting with an already formed system
of normative conduct (Judaism or Christianity), is not to be
mobilised in the direction of a code of norms. The ethics of
singularity is rather a form of pathos and primordial affection.
4. The singular always implies a multiplication that is built on the
schema: the original singular and the singularised subject/s.
This multiplication renders possible a phenomenological
approach to the constitution of singularity, since it is through
the secondary singularisation of the subject that the singular
is manifested.
5. The above-mentioned multiplication is, though, not equivalent
to the distance that phenomenology normally produces between
being and appearing. In fact, the singular reduces every form of
duplication and installs a monist approach to manifestation.
The singular is always simple and non-compounded.
6. The phenomenology of singularity is a suspension of the
synthetic thought and is built on a first-person discourse. To
this observation is associated the radical denial of neutrality,
totality, continuity, homogeneity, communality, repetition,
and opposition.
7. Though non-synthetic, the singular has usually an inner
structure that does not form a type of fracture, but makes
possible an internal alteration.
8. The phenomenological treatment of the singular is determined
by a more radical reductive move and presupposes a continuous
self-suspension. To Husserl’s prerogative of a phenomenology as

an infinite task corresponds a specific modality of instability that
inhabits the singular. As a result, the phenomenology of singularity
has to be defined as excessive, abusive, and exasperating.
9. Related to the previous remark, a phenomenology of the singular
operates a distinction between the time of the constituted and
the anarchic temporality of the original singularity (diachronic
or non-ecstatic). The same functional distinction is introduced
within language183: a more primitive saying constantly surpasses
the phenomenological said of the constituted singular. However,
this differentiation does not invalidate the monist approach
to singularity: in fact, both Levinas and Henry consider the
constituted realm to be an instrument that does not dispute the
uniqueness of the constituting singular.
10. The phenomenology of singularity, being monist in its essence,
abolishes the validity of difference in favour of an interest in
non-in-difference, or indifference.
11. A phenomenological exploration of singularity advances from
an account of the original to an investigation of a pre-original
singularising pole. In this transformation, religious themes are
commonly interposed. However, despite the capitalisation of this
pre-original singularity (the Other, Life, Self, etc.), the reference
183 While this split can be seen as illusory (Cf. M. Borch-Jacobsen, ‘L’inconscient
malgré tout’, Les Études Philosophiques, 1, 1988, pp. 1-36: ‘seeing itself in
the mirror, saying itself beyond language’, p.14), or even aporetic (‘this apo-
ria does not come from the difficulty of saying the absolute, because the ab-
solute can also be thought as the one that offers the word, instead of retain-
ing it’, J.-L. Chrétien, ‘La vie sauve’, Les Études Philosophiques, 1, 1988, pp.
37-49, p. 41), the constant reoccurrence of a negative discourse throughout
philosophy demonstrates that it responds to a fundamental need in the
economy of our constitution. To this extent, phenomenology has generated
a significant step forward by means of its conceptual register. In particular,
both Levinas and Henry have greatly contributed to addressing this issue
and to connecting it to interests in a foundational philosophy.
to religious motifs is to be comprehended as motivated by a

lack of conceptual tools. In this sense, the singular develops
through an approach to the ultimate, but religion is here only
the said that the manifestation of a primitive saying requires.
Furthermore, religion184 understood in terms of re-linking,
hints to the proximity of a normative and ethical discourse
that we have already mentioned before.
12. The singular is produced by an imperative return to a
first philosophy, which attempts to establish a discursive
connection to the origin and the original. Consequently, the
phenomenology of singularity is a ‘maximalist’ project, based
on a fascination with the absolute185.
184 Against the outcry of more orthodox phenomenologists, let us quote Hus-
serl with one significant remark: ‘as every evidence has its right, the prop-
er attitude toward religion is tolerance – toward all genuine religion’ (D.
Cairns, op. cit., p. 91). Thus, the hypothesis of a ‘theological’ turn in recent
phenomenology, to which we accord only a limited justification, can be
seen as determined by an internal diversification, rather than as a step out of
phenomenology.
185 Against D. Janicaud’s opinion, we consider that a maximalist tendency is
embodied in every phenomenological attempt, even if only in an implicit
manner. Thus, we refute the idea that preoccupations with the origin and
the original ‘have nothing phenomenological in themselves except for their
name’ (La phénoménologie éclatée, Paris, Éds. de l’Éclat, 1998, p. 26). On
the contrary, we have to acknowledge as legitimate the efforts that phenom-
enology makes towards establishing a first philosophy, and not reduce the
richness of its explorations to certain domains. Thus, while we agree with
Janicaud’s call for a pluralist phenomenology, we think that this diversity
is preserved precisely because of the attempt to give ultimate explanations
in relation to the variety of our experiential grounds. Consequently, ‘disen-
gaging the phenomenological research from its recurrent ambitions, foun-
dational and/or totalitarian [totalisatrices]’ (p.109) means to amputate its
interest in being a valid philosophical option. Yet again, this does not mean
that we reject the idea that phenomenology can be positively characterised
13. The phenomenological approach to the singular is prior to its

description and, insofar as phenomenology is already logos,
singularity situates itself at the limits of a phenomenological
exposition. In fact, the singular requires a primitive closure
to language, or a barbarous description. Accordingly, when it
succumbs to description, phenomenology becomes an already
presumptive enterprise. To this extent, the phenomenological
presentation of the singular is always partially constructive.
14. To the defeat of the descriptive imperative in phenomenology, is
added the refutation of an eidetic variation: the singular cannot
be universalised, but has, though, a universal significance186.
Nevertheless, singularity presupposes, as we have pointed out
earlier, a primordial intuitive manifestation. In this sense, the
singular is an impression, rather than an expression.
Further considerations: between a singular in itself and a

singular givenness
The possibility of a phenomenology of the singular has now to
be scrutinised in light of the results unveiled thorugh our research.
In its initial form, phenomenology is, as we have discovered in our
previous investigations, synthetic. As Husserl states in his Cartesian
Meditations, the constitutive ego functions ‘as a nexus, connected
in the unity of an all-embracing genesis, an infinite nexus of syn-
thetically congruous performances’187. From a phenomenological
perspective, a singular datum has the status of a non-phenomenon,
of something that refuses to be given. When confronted to the pos-
by means of a plurality of inspirational thoughts.
186 Cf. J.-F. Marquet’s insightful observation (op. cit., p. 51) about the ‘univer-
sal singular’, ‘at the same time proper name and noun’.
187 CM pp. 81, 114.
sibility of a singular givenness, Husserl’s phenomenology takes refuge

in an aporetic discourse that points to its own incapacity to circum-
scribe singularity in the sphere of givenness. Husserl’s phenomenol-
ogy blocks the access to a unique and non-comparative experience.
This means that givenness is always organised around a repetitive
nucleus, which cannot advance in its explicative attempts to the ul-
timate elements that form our experiences as juxtapositions of more
primitive data. There is always a degree of presumptive interpretation
closely linked to our descriptive abilities. While we agree that our
common experiences are situated within an intermediary realm that
cannot grasp its telos or its origin, we think that the main contribu-
tion of a phenomenology of singularity has been to suggest that there
are giving experiences that cannot be provoked and are not inten-
tionally activated. In this sense, we do not exclude the possibility of a
first and singular givenness in our genetic formation. Obviously, this
hypothesis cannot be accepted if one adopts a Kantian schema where
time and space, as a priori intuitions, organise and create a type of
commonality that is prior to our experiences. However, both Levinas
and Henry refer not to the particular genetic evolution of individu-
als, but rather to a singularity that is a continuous affection. Thus,
they reserve a region of immemorial passivity in order to explain,
in line with a licit phenomenology, the way in which the singular
manifests itself in the present condition of the constitutive ego. The
move beyond these presuppositions seems to be speculative even for
an account that is open to a constructive approach. Nevertheless,
Levinas and Henry attach a form of continuity without memory to
the experience of the singular. This means that the givenness of the
singular is itself singular and non-repetitive, and involves a form of
constant forgetfulness.
As far as a singularity in itself is concerned, the assumption that
the interest in being has to be mediated by an interest into modes
of givenness imposes certain limitations. In accordance with this

imperative, a singularity in itself remains open to contradictions
and speculations. This suggests that a discussion about an existing
singularity goes beyond the limits imposed by a strict phenomeno-
logical discourse. In other words, a phenomenology of the singular
can only refer to a singular givenness and not to the givenness of
an existing singular in itself. However, this conclusion is not com-
pletely accurate. Indeed, Husserl’s idea of an intentional relation
to the real is not based on purely imaginative considerations. The
phenomenological project is characterised by an implicit ontologi-
cal commitment to the real. This connection to a reality in itself
might suggest that an existing singularity could be validated. Thus,
it can be stated that singularity belongs not to the phenomenologi-
cal suspension of existence in its pretension to reality, but to this
reality itself. This is the manner in which one can affirm, in agree-
ment with common opinions, that the real is an infinite realm of
singulars: everything is totally different from the other entities that
exist independently of us. Indeed, we often hear about the singu-
larity of a specific tree, or landscape, etc., and it seems that it is only
our experience of these entities that is synthetic. Otherwise stated,
if a singular givenness is not possible due to the comparative nature
of our experiential capacities, the givenness of the singular might
very well be possible. But to state that the singular can be given,
even if not in singular experiences, means that a contract with a
pre-existing ground is already in place. According to this view, the
possibility of the singular would have to be considered separately
from the synthetic activity of the phenomenological subject. A sin-
gular being is, hence, possible because of the fortunate ignorance
that a tree has about itself being a tree, one of a kind. Yet, what this
ontological commitment to a realist perspective introduces is not
singularity as an undoubted datum. It is rather, from the standpoint
of an orthodox phenomenology, a speculative projection, an exten-

sion of the real over our constitutive powers. Whereas the idea of
a real singularity seems to be fully natural, it also tends to obscure
the distinction between the acceptance of a pre-existing reality, and
our capacity of attaching to this reality a description that surpasses
our constitutive abilities. On this matter, we have to stress the dif-
ference between what a limited set of living experiences can furnish
and what, in principle, can never be accessible to experience. That
is to say, we have to accept, as Husserl suggests, a broad perspec-
tive upon constitution to include the community of other egos,
since no one would distrust the fact that someone has experienced
directly a certain living condition about being on the Moon. Thus,
it is important to note that phenomenology is not to be reduced to
what is given as it is meant by me. It is rather the aptitude to experi-
ence something that has to be underlined in connection to what is
real. So, Husserl’s phenomenology is restrictive with regard to real-
ity in its claims to validity, but allows for a weaker ontological com-
mitment. This is realised through an ontological turn to objectivity
as infinite task, which presupposes validation from a community of
subjects. Subjects have, de facto, different sensuous experiences as
these vary in the case of each individual. Indeed, as Husserl asserts
in Ideas II, there is ‘no sensuous-intuitive content whatsoever that
could be given as identical intersubjectively’188. In this sense, objec-
tivity cannot be achieved through mere sensuous givenness, but is
rather an ideal formation that goes beyond the unique experience
that each subject has of the ‘true’ world. Nevertheless, our original
experience of the world points to a primordial level of constitution
without which objectivity cannot be given. Here, however, we have
to add a further distinction. Namely, it is one thing to affirm that
188 Id II, pp. 93, 88.
what escapes the realm of a possible experience cannot be validly

accepted as existing, and another thing to establish in exact lines
the configuration of the real. For the latter aspect, we have to rely
on an intersubjectively determined objectivity, on a ‘societal con-
sciousness as a total group of possible appearances that is construct-
ed out of individual groups’189. Objectivity is, as a result, an open
idea that has to account not only for actual individuals, but also for
potential ones (hence, the importance of eidetic variations). This
is the only existence-ground that Husserl accepts as pointing to
reality on the basis of a previous nullification through the epoché.
The difference between the natural attitude and the phenomeno-
logically reduced attitude lays exactly in this new approach to the
question of the how of the singular in itself. Thus, for Husserl, if
it is purely dogmatic to assert a reality beyond the powers of con-
stitutive egos, it is not at all absurd to postulate the possibility of
acquiring an ontological contract with what it appears on the basis
of intersubjective confirmations.
Our previous results imply that, though we might not have the
same intuitive data in the experience of singulars, if we can validate
intersubjectively a contract with existence that permits us to rely on
a singular in itself then singularity can have the status of an existing
pole. As we have agreed that, in accordance with Husserl’s philoso-
phy, there are no singular experiences, in the strong sense of the word,
the only way out of this inquest is by appealing to the intersubjective
constitution of transcendental egos. Going beyond this limit would
be once more equivalent to a relapse into dogmatism and specula-
tion. Sustaining a naïve ontological position that binds us to accept
something that we cannot experience seems delusive. At the same
time, surpassing the ontological commitment resulted from an inter-
subjective community of constitutive egos seems to be spurious.
189 Id II, pp. 93, 88.

But problems appear again once we accept that the singular can
be given only through a community of transcendental egos because
of Husserl’s lack of precision and clarity on this topic, which has
already been the target of numerous criticisms. To mention one of
them, Schutz considers that the hypothesis of a transcendental ‘we-
relationship’ is extremely doubtful. Indeed, within the community
of transcendental egos, I constitute the other egos, but only for me.
Thus, ‘unless we were to define community in such a way that, con-
trary to meaningful usage, there would be a community for me, and
one for you, without the two necessary coinciding’190, the idea of a
community of transcendental egos has to be rejected. Furthermore,
for our considerations regarding the possibility of a communal con-
stitution, the solitary access of a transcendental ego to the experi-
ence that is supposed to be open to a multiplicity of constitutive
egos is far from satisfactory. Moreover, let us recall Cairn’s confes-
sion that Husserl used to employ the term God ‘occasionally’ and
‘in private conversation’ to refer to ‘the community of transcenden-
tal egos which “creates” a world’191. What is interesting here is that
Husserl relates the constitutive performance of the transcendental
egos to God, which implies that for him the transcendental com-
munity is not to be reduced to the sphere of a particular ego and its
ontological validations. Let us return now to Schutz’s observation
and Fink’s response to him. Confirming the problematic dimen-
sion of Husserl’s most commonly known model of transcendental
intersubjectivity, Fink points out that in Husserl’s late manuscripts
the question of the plurality of constitutive egos is solved by stat-
ing the necessity for a transcendental primal life, ‘neither one nor
many, neither factual, nor essential’. Indeed, this primal ego is rath-
er ‘the ultimate ground of all these distinctions’192. The introduc-
190 A. Schutz ed., Collected Papers III, p. 76.
192 A. Schutz, op. cit., p. 86.
tion of this primitive form of transcendental life bears similarity

to Fink’s own differentiation between the three egos involved in
every reductive move. That is, the mundane or concrete individual,
the transcendental constitutive ego and, finally, the transcendental
observer. However, the separation of the transcendental sphere into
two separate regions193 is not sufficient for our research. The reason
is that it is only the constitutive ego that has interests in the forma-
tion of the world, whilst the ‘phenomenologising onlooker’ does
not participate in the constitution of the mundane sphere. The
transcendental observer, Fink says, is guided by a teleological inter-
est that aims at ‘the totality of being’194. But if the transcendental
community of egos is problematic when constitutive issues are to
be discussed, it seems that an ontological commitment through
transcendental intersubjectivity is also impossible. Indeed, one has
to operate on the basis of a subjective and, to a certain extent,
solipsistic grasp in order to approach claims to reality by means of
a transcendental constitution. The point is, then, that singularity,
even if existing as a thing in itself, cannot be opened up through a
community of transcendental egos. But is there another way out of
the impasse created by the impossible communal validation of the
existence of singularity?
As we saw previously, a singular givenness was not acceptable
in light of Husserl’s phenomenology because of the synthetic na-
ture of the ego’s constitutive activity. What we attempted to do
then, was to find a way of validating the hypothesis of an existing
singularity. Restricting ourselves to the imperative to givenness, we
proved that claims to reality have to go through an intersubjective
legitimisation. However, when discussing the status of a transcen-
193 E. Fink, Sixth Cartesian Meditation (The Idea of a Transcendental Theory of
Method), Bloomington, Indiana University Press, 1995, p. 20.
194 E. Fink, op. cit., p. 21, note 39.
dental community of constituting egos, we encountered serious

difficulties and inconsistencies. In this sense, we are now obliged to
weaken our conditions of validation in relation to the real. Instead
of taking the perspective of a transcendental community of egos,
let us work with a concrete case of an intersubjective encounter.
This model will be applied to explain the relation that Levinas’s and
Henry’s writings can have with Husserl’s phenomenology.
Far from being a mere historical evolution in the themes dedi-
cated traditionally to phenomenology, the accounts of Levinas and
Henry propound a more complex attitude towards a phenomeno-
logical research. Indeed, working in the margins of canonical ex-
aminations can prove to be greatly useful for suspending dogmatic
claims to legitimacy. The excess out of the boundaries delimited by
the formative figure in phenomenology imposes a positive distance
with regard to primal texts. In this sense, phenomenology has to be
conceived not as a dead letter, but rather as an inspiration that these
excessive interpretations still keep alive. Nevertheless, the question
that one has to address in the context of this cross-examination
is where to establish the delimiting line between mere creativity
and a rigorous exploration of phenomena. In order to answer to
this question let us direct our attention towards two manners of
approaching the singular. More precisely, one has to distinguish
between a direct and intuitive phenomenology, and an indirect and
an imaginative one. At fist sight, the second type of phenomenology
seems totally inaccurate and misleading. In fact, the merit of phe-
nomenology has been that of opening a direct access to phenomena
by annulling previous conceptual horizons, or pre-decisions. But,
as strange as it may seem at first, the imaginative account has its
origins in Husserl’s texts. Indeed, the failure to account directly
for the experience of another person propels Husserl to opt for a
type of apperceptive encountering. That is to say, the other is never
given to me directly, but rather indirectly, on the basis of the imagi-
native abilities that the subject can develop in line with the percep-
tual clues received through immediate experience. The model of
acceding to the other person’s life in indirect imaginative processes,
which are not to be confused with either pure analogy or radical
empathy, can also be applied in the case of a phenomenology of the
singular. Husserl himself, as we have already noticed, considers that
imagination through a free variation of perceptual data is essential
for an eidetic research. In this case, we suggest that a reading of the
texts that posit the principles of a phenomenological exploit of sin-
gularity offers the same indirect account that is at work in the in-
tersubjective encounters. At the centre of the discussion is now the
very possibility of a constructive phenomenology, which has a non-
intuitive foundation allowing though for the intuitive exploration
to take place. It is well known that Fink sustains a creative approach
to phenomenology. According to one of his declarations, ‘the phe-
nomenological field is not “there” at all, but must first be created.
Thus the phenomenological reduction is creative, but of something
which bears a necessary relation to that which is “there”’195. From
this perspective, the production of multiple phenomenological in-
vestigations of singularity has the merit of opening up a different
interpretative framework. The question remains, though, as to the
rigorous nature of this approach. Indeed, where are we to trace
the boundary between fiction or mere literary productions, and
a laborious and systematic phenomenological examination? Here,
one should look for experiential evidence that can send us back to
the intuitive elements of these accounts, to the ‘there’ that Fink
has mentioned before. Thus, to appeal once more to the situation
of a concrete intersubjective relation, one has to consider that an
indirect phenomenological approach, as paradoxical as it might
sound, is possible and greatly facilitated by the norm of normality
with which one departs in his research. Similarly, in looking for the
beneficial aspects of a phenomenology of singularity, as determined
by Levinas and Henry, we have to stress the connections that relate
them to our norm of normality. These, though not exclusive, offer
the chance to experience indirectly through imaginative efforts the
type of intuitive elements that resonate with our own experiential
profile. If we adopt this frame of mind in reading such texts, we are
also compelled to accept that, while working on an eidetic exami-
nation, phenomenology is not to be reduced only to universal data
and a purist form of research. Rather, there is a rich and broad spec-
trum of experiences that can be approached through phenomenol-
ogy, which cannot be classified as universal, nor merely as purely
personal. In this perspective, the elaboration of regional phenom-
enologies responds better to the type of inquiry that we are looking
for. This new task is in agreement with the project of a constructive
phenomenology. Thus, far from being restricted to a universalising
community of transcendental egos, which is very problematic as
we have already remarked, we can apply the model of a concrete
intersubjective relation in order to interpret and receive the contri-
butions made by Levinas and Henry to phenomenology through
their preoccupation with the singular.
So, we cannot refute an interest in a phenomenology of the
singular on the basis of our own lack of direct apprehension.
Furthermore, we cannot suspend singularity and consider it as non-
existent if our personal intuitive experiences have not encountered
it in a direct manner. However, we can neither accept isolated evi-
dence in favour of experiences that cannot be, in principle, open to
a communal experiencing. What we have suggested is an approach
through indirect clues that uses the texts on a phenomenology of
singularity in order to point to a potential norm of an intuitive
grasp. Otherwise stated, we have to accept a constructive approach
to phenomenology, while relating every imaginative construction
to an intuitive basis. Employing the results of a phenomenological

account of the singular, we can deduce that singularity is related
to our deepest levels of experience, which connect us to the real
ground of our constitutional processes. Indeed, the experience of
the singular involves a dimension of immediateness and passive
affection, which suggests that singularity can be validated only at
the most profound proximity with the real, where our active con-
stitution is at its lowest. From a phenomenological perspective, this
is the only connection that we can establish with a singular in it-
self, insofar as a condition of receptivity translates the maximal ap-
proach to an existing ground. It is through the texts on singularity
that this observation has been constructed and connected to our
own intuitive experiences.
Consequently, there might be a singular in itself, which accords
with our primal experiences and with the necessity of adopting a
constructive approach to phenomenology. To support this view, let
us recall two of Husserl’s own observations. Firstly, ‘only phenom-
enological treatment can provide a real solution to any problem’196.
Secondly, ‘the higher levels of phenomenological analysis lead us to
problems of phenomenological construction, the construction of
phenomenological hypotheses’197. From this perspective, let us make
a suggestive conclusion: a singular in itself is a phenomenological
hypothesis based on genuine evidence. It might not be a universa-
lised experience, but we have already proved that this is not a suffi-
cient reason for rejecting indirect clues to possibilities of direct ap-
prehension. Still, the experiential ground mobilised by Levinas and
Henry responds to the fundamental bases of our constitutive efforts
(the origin and the original) and this is an argument good enough
for accepting the suggestions of an interpretative hypothesis.
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THE EXASPERATING

Cover photo: Maria & Marius Constantinescu

© 2009 Zeta Books for the present edition

ISBN: 978-973-1997-04-9 (paperback)

I.THE PROBLEM AND ITS BACKGROUND. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

II. THE PRIMITIVE SENSE–DATA,

4. Hyle: between pure presence and temporal difference. . . . . . . . 75

III. THE MANIFOLD–UNITARY SINGULARS,

1 The singularity of the transcendental. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94

The syntheses of the living body. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 128

IV. THE PRE–PHENOMENAL: SINGULARITY AS

1. The anonymous pre–ego: time–constituting

Genetic constitution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168

V. LEVINAS ON THE SINGULARISING SINGULARITY

1. Singularity beyond Husserl . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184

‘Describing’ the other. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213

VI. MICHEL HENRY ON THE SINGULAR

1. Against Husserl: towards absolute singularity. . . . . . . . . . . . . 241

A barbarous invisible. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 271

Works by Edmund Husserl

La Terre ne se meut pas – La Terre ne se meut pas [Manuscripts D17,

Works by Emmanuel Levinas

Works by Michel Henry

Works by Jacque Derrida

SP – ‘Speech and Phenomena’, in Speech and Phenomena and Other Essays

Works by Gilles Deleuze

Works by Jean–Luc Marion

From this perspective, we can say that singularity undercuts, in

open to relativism, but sustain our needs for an immobile ground.

In light of these distinctions, the singular, if it is to be accepted

The Latin semantic area of the term ‘singularity’ is remarkable

peculiar, individual’2 and, in this situation, ‘singularity’ is related to

In demarcating the denotative area of ‘singularity’, it is impor-

ity” or “generality” and tolerates, at the end, only a proper name’5.

Merleau-Ponty’s work will be given some consideration in rela-

emphasise singularity as primal philosophical concern,

tation and interpretation of Henry’s phenomenology offered by this

undoubting heuristic value, situates Henry’s writings in a replicat-

ond definition, the method functions at a meta-phenomenal level

reductive interpretations. As Husserl himself says, ‘the form of phe-

Outline of the research

turn, in the first chapter, to an analysis of hyle in Husserl’s phe-

lutions. Firstly, Levinas’s phenomenological grasp of the singular

be singular if it comprises an inner partition. Thirdly, immanence

‘Later Husserl complained of the objectional etymological

THE PROBLEM AND ITS BACKGROUND

Reflective vs. descriptive phenomenology

to this point, as it invokes the need for an immediate grasp of the

perceptual experience that gives the object in person, in an original

The originality of being

is founded. Correspondingly, we have to infer that phenomenol-

Correspondingly, the genetic ‘turn’ in Husserl’s work unveils a

manner in which original donation enters the framework of phe-

Description vs. presumption

ogy can only achieve approximations, and construct, in infinitum,

every universal principle of a first, even that of facticity in radi-

if only in an aporetic attempt18, the ‘things themselves’ have more

ment to comply with things themselves has to bring us further than

I should have been more unfaithful to him, more ungrateful, but

Thus, measuring Husserl’s thought against its own assumptions

of describing the non-prejudiced givenness of things. Without re-

istic’ form of discourse that one finds in Husserl’s phenomenology,

Hermeneutics and singularity